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A NE IV BOOK B Y JO SI AH ALLEN'S 
WIFE. 

" SWEET CICELY; or, JOSIAH ALLEN AS A POLITICIAN." 
Of thrilling interest. Over 100 illustrations, square 12nio, 
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FUNK & WAGNALLS, Publishers, io& 12 Dey St., N. Y. 



J 



BIETIGHEIM." 



Yet, I doubt not thro' the ages one increasing purpose runs, 
And the thoughts of men are widen'd with the process of the suns." 

—Lockaley Hall, 




FUNK & WAGNALLS. 

NEW YORK : . o„ „ LONDON : 

10 AND 12 DEY STREET. 44 FLEET STREET. 

All rights reserved. 



^^ 



I^V^ 



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Entered, according to Act of Congress, in tlie year 1886, by 

FUNK & WAGNALLS, 

In tlie Office of tlxe Librarian of Congress at Waslungton, D, C. 



mTEODUOTIOlSr. 



Denvee, November 20, 1932. 
Hon. John W. Minok, 

Member of Congress, 3d Col. Dist. 

Dear Sm : The undersigned, a committee ap- 
pointed at the mass-meeting of the citizens of Den- 
ver, held on the 14th inst., to devise means for 
relieving the distress of the poor and laboring 
classes of this citj during the coming winter, have 
the honor to state that one of the plans already de- 
cided upon for raising a public Relief Fund is the 
organization of a course of ten lectures to be deliv- 
ered at the Denver Opera House during the winter 
months, and upon dates to be hereafter agreed 
upon. In this plan we ask you to co-operate with 
us by permitting the announcement of your name 
as that of one of the lecturers of the course ; and 
while leaving to yourself the choice, we yet venture 
to suggest, in view of your honorable connection 
with the events which marked the memorable war 
of 1890-91, and your carefnl study of the causes 
leading to and the results ensuing from that great 
struggle, that one or more lectures on that subject, 
including some of your personal reminiscences, will 
not only prove a source of general entertainment 
and interest, but will serve to enkindle anew in the 



4 - lifTRODUCTION. 

minds of the youth of this generation a vivid recol- 
lection of the patriotic zeal, patient courage, and 
historic achievements of their forefathers, when 
bearing the Stars and Stripes against a foreign foe 
on foreign soil. 

Kequesting the favor of an early reply, we have 
the honor to* be, sir, very respectfully yours, 

H. Sibley Mooee, Chairman, \ 

DwiQHT F. Peck, > Committee. 

SiGMUND KOBLER, ) 

Vevet Viixa, November 22, 1932. 
Messrs. H. Sibley Moore, D wight F. Peck, and 

SiGMUND KOBLEK, 

Citizens' Relief Committee, Denver. 

Gentlemen : In reply to your communication of 
the 20th inst., I beg to express to you my acknowl- 
edgments for the compliment which it implies, and 
to state that I shall be happy to co-operate with you 
by the delivery of three lectures on the subject sug- 
gested, on any dates between the 23d of December 
and the 15th of January next. As 1 leave for 
Washington within the next ten days in order to be 
jDresent at the opening of the Session (expecting, 
however, to return to Denver for the Christmas holi- 
days), I would request you to inform me as early 
as possible of the dates assigned me. My lectures 
will be entitled " Bietigheim : I. Its Causes, II. Its 
Cost, III. Its Consequences," and I shall endeavor 
to review the political and social causes and effects 



INTRODUCTION". • 5 

of the momentous struggle of forty years ago, 
bringing in, as occasion offers, some of my personal 
recollections of a campaign which startled the world 
and sealed the downfall of the greatest military 
power of the nineteenth century. 
I am, gentlemen, very truly yours, 

John "W. MmoR, M.C. 



IK^TRODUCTION. 



DENVER 

OPERA HOUSE 

(WINTER SEASON, 1932-33) 



The Citizens' Relief Committee have the honor to announce that 

ON. John W. Minor 



M. C. 
has consented to deliver a course of three Lectures on 





JJ 



/. ITS CAUSES DEC. 26th. 

II. ITS COST JAITY 5th. 

III. ITS CONSEQUENCES . . " 12th. 



Course Tickets $2.00 

Single Lectures 75 

Proceeds to be devoted to the relief of the poor of Denver. 



LECTURES BEGIN AT 



7.SO P.M. 



H. SIBLEY MOORE, \ 
DWIGHT F. PECK, I Committee. 
SIGMUND KOBLER, ) 



INTRODUCTION^. 7 

(From the Denver Daily Times, December 2Qth, 1932.) 

TO-NIGIIT'S LECTUKE. 

We take occasion to remind the readers of the 
Thnes that Hon. John W. Minor will deliver at 
the Opera House this evening the first of his prom- 
ised series of lectures in aid of the Charitable Kelief 
Fund. The distinguished lecturer has chosen for 
his topic, under the title of '^ Bietigheim," the 
events connected with the great war of 1890-91, 
and will treat this evening especially of the causes, 
political and otherwise, which combined to bring 
about the stupendous conflict culminating in a vic- 
tory so glorious yet so dearly bought ; reserving for 
his two subsequent lectures the narration of the 
thrilling events of the campaign, in which he par- 
ticipated as a line officer, and a glance at the im- 
portant social and political changes wrought by that 
memorable crisis in the world's history. 

In this connection, although Mr. Minor is well 
known to the citizens of Denver, among whom he 
has dwelt, honored and respected, for over a quarter 
of a century past, we deem it not out of place to 
reproduce here a short sketch of his life, which we 
find in the Congressional Directory for the current 
session — viz. : 

John W. Minor was born at Dayton, 0., Sep- 
tember 25th, 1870, and received a common school 
education ; in 1883, on the death of his father, an 
Episcopal clergyman, he was sent by his mother to 
a relative at Kansas City ; found employment in 
the law-office of Clark & Benzinger, and later as 



8 li^^TRODUCTIOiq-. 

law-copyist and clerk with Hon. John S. Darrall, 
devoting himself in leisure moments to studying 
for admission to the bar ; on the breaking ont of 
hostilities in the spring of 1890 was commissioned 
second lieutenant in the Fourth Kansas Infantry, 
went to Europe with that command, and partici- 
pated in all its engagements ; was successively 
brevetted first lieutenant at Hoheneck and captain 
at Colmar for gallant conduct ; while in command 
of his company during a momentary repulse on the 
third day's fighting at Bietigheim was severely 
wounded, and carried within the enemy's lines ; 
was restored to his friends under the Articles of 
Surrender after the battle, and as lieutenant-colonel 
of his decimated battalion was enabled to rejoin his 
command in season to participate with it in the 
famous triumphal review of the allied armies at 
Paris in June, 1891 ; returned home with his com- 
mand, and resuming his law studies at Kansas City, 
was admitted to practise in 1893, and shortly there- 
after to partnership with his former patron, Mr. 
Darrall ; w^as elected in 1895 to the Kansas Legis- 
lature, and served tliree successive terms there ; was 
appointed. United States District Attorney for Col- 
orado in 1904 by President Fairchild, and removed 
to Denver, where he has since resided ; in 1912 
resigned District Attorneyship and was elected 
Mayor of Denver ; in 1916 was elected State Sen- 
ator, and in 1920 President of the Colorado Senate. 
In 1924: went to Europe with his family, revisiting 
most of the scenes of his former campaigns, and 
on his return in 1926 was elected as a ]^ationalist 



INTRODUCTIOlSr. 9 

to the Seventieth Congress ; was successively there- 
after elected to the Seventy-first and Seventy-second 
Congresses, and was re-elected to the Seventy-third 
Congress as a Nationalist, receiving 26,079 votes 
against 23.476 votes for Plardcastle, Democrat. 



BIETIGHEIM." 

ITS 

CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 



I. 

ITS CAUSES. 



In tracing, so far as our own country is con- 
cerned, the events which led to the crisis of 1890, 
it is not necessary to go farther back than five or 
six years — that is, to the time when the Kepiibhcan 
Party, after holding the reins of Government for a 
quarter of a century, blotting out negro slavery 
from the statute-books, and laying forever to rest 
the pernicious doctrine of State Rights, finally fell 
from power through the disgust created in the 
popular mind by the aspirations and jealousies of its 
leaders. From the inauguration of President Cleve- 
land in the spring of 1885 dates the beginning of 
an era of real reunion between the North and South. 
With the return of the Democratic Party to power 
the old sectional feeling which, since the earliest 
days, had been more or less a barrier to national 
unity, forever disappeared, and there can be no 
better proof of the union of sentiment which ex- 



12 "BIETIGHEIM." 

isted at that period than that represented in Wal- 
lace's historical painting in the Senate Chamber at 
"Washington, entitled ^' The Burial of General 
Grant," where troops from Massachusetts and New 
York are to be seen marching side by side with 
troops from Yirginia and Georgia, and where a host 
of Confederate veterans, headed bj their former 
commander, Johnston, are portrayed following their 
departed conqueror to his last resting-place. 

To one closely studying the politics of that day it 
is of great interest to note the development of the 
struggle between a deep-rooted sense of allegiance 
to party on the one hand, and an independent de- 
votion to purity in politics, without regard to party, 
on the other. It was the latter sentiment that 
placed Mr. Cleveland in the chair, and it was his 
tacit acknowledgment of that fact that animated his 
entire administration. His manly and determined 
stand on the question of Civil Service Reform, and 
his bold repudiation of the baneful Jacksonian 
theory of victors and spoils, enabled him to free 
himself from the worst elements of the party that 
nominated him, to rally in their stead to his sup- 
port a large and respectable following, including 
many of his former opponents, and to lay the 
foundation of that great national party which has 
since controlled the Government. With all the 
more admiration must this important step toward 
political reform be regarded when it is remembered 
under what bitter attacks by his own party and 
harassing foreign complications it was carried out 
during the latter half of President Cleveland's ad- 
ministration. The Panama Canal imbroglio brought 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 13 

about by De Lesseps's disappointed vanity, the 
troublesome question in regard to tlie Sandwich 
Islands Protectorate, and the imminent danger of 
a costly war with China growing out of the perse- 
cution of Christian missionaries, combined to dis- 
tract public attention from home politics and the 
conduct of internal affairs. Yet, thanks to the 
President's common-sense and firmness and to the 
prudence and sagacity of his advisers, all of these 
questions were successively solved in a manner satis- 
factory to the national honor ; and when the famous 
National Convention, composed of delegates chosen 
from every Congressional district in the United 
States, without regard to former political connections 
or party ties, assembled at Louisville in June, 1888, 
to select a candidate for the Presidency, the en- 
thusiasm and unanimity with which the candidacy 
was offered to President Cleveland was only equalled 
by the popular regret which was felt on his an- 
nouncing his refusal to stand for a second term. 

About this time, too, an enhanced value began 
to be put upon the rights and privileges of Ameri- 
can citizenship.* Thinking people commenced to 



* The privilege and franchise of American citizenship should 
be granted with care, and extended to those only who intend 
in good faith to' assume its duties and responsibilities when 
attaining its privileges and benefits ; it should be withheld 
from those who merely go through the forms of naturalization 
with the intent of escaping the duties of their original allegi- 
ance without taking upon themselves those of their new status, 
or who may acquire the rights of American citizenship for no 
other than a hostile purpose toward their original governments. 
These evils have had many flagrant illustrations. — President 
Clevelaiid's Message of 1885. 



14 '^BIETIGHEIM." 

doubt the wisdom of longer leaving our doors wide 
open to the emigration of the world, and of receiv- 
ing with o))en arms and without let or hindrance 
all the impoverished elements of overcrowded 
Europe. 

It became only too evident that our naturalization 
laws had been shamefully prostituted to political 
purposes. Hordes of social demagogues who had 
been thrust out as firebrands from Germany, 
Austria, and Russia, and possessing only a sufficient 
smattering of knowledge to render them dangerous 
among ignorant working people, were availing 
themselves of American citizenship, either with 
the avowed purpose of returning, passport in hand, 
to their native countries to resume their seditious 
work, or to remain and stir up social strife in the 
larger cities of the land which had adopted them. 
The attempted general uprising of workingmen in 
1887, on the anniversary of the birth of Karl Marx, 
the founder of the International Society, while it 
proved futile, and resulted in the summary execu- 
tion of the thirteen conspirators who were proven 
to have organized it, yet served a good purpose in 
compelling public attention to the pressing need of 
a restriction upon naturalization and foreign immi- 
gration. The country w^as, moreover, becoming too 
rapidly peopled ; a steady stream of Germans, 
Scandinavians, and Irish was flowing westward from 
the Atlantic seaports to the Eocky Mountain 
regions ; corporations composed principally of far- 
seeing English capitalists had managed quietly to 
pre-empt immense tracts of fertile territory from 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AN'D CONSEQUENCES. 15 

the public domain ; -' it began to be frequently 
asked in the newspapers and at public meetings 
whether our forefathers, the founders of this repub- 
lic, had ever calculated the full extent to which the 
poor and oppressed of all the world would ulti- 
mately avail themselves of the generous offer of a 
home and protection from tyranny, f Presently 
these casual inquiries took the form of a general 
call for legislation to amend the evil. The National 
Party's platform of 1888 demands a residence of 
ten years and the payment of a poll tax as require- 
ments for a foreigner's naturalization. A proposi- 
tion of this character was, in fact, brought before 
the Senate at its ensuing session, and would no doubt 
have been promptly acted upon had not, at that 
juncture, events of far greater moment monopoHzed 
the attention of Congress. But the voice of the 



* Washington, December 8th, 1885. — In the Senate to-day a 
memorial was presented by the New Hampshire Legislature, 
pointing out that non-residents, aliens, principally British sub- 
jects, owned 20,000,000 acres of public lands in New Hamp- 
shire, and urging the necessity of legislation to deal with such 
purchases. 

f IMMIGEATION — CHANGED SENTIMENT. 

It is a very striking circumstance that the great foreign im- 
migration to the United States, which formerly was our com- 
mon boast, begins now to be regarded by a large part of the 
people, in the older communities more especially, with very 
different feelings. Instead of swelling with pride at the 
thought that the Eepublic offers an asylum for the poor and 
oppressed of every land, they are asking themselves whether 
the welfare of those already here does not require more dis- 
crimination as to who shall be invited. — New York Sun, Jan- 
uary 28th, 1886. 



16 " BIETIGHEIM. 



j» 



people, foreign born as well as native, was out- 
spoken and strong in declaring that the time had 
come when the guards stationed at the doors of 
American citizenship must be strengthened, and a 
warning be sent over to the peasantry of Europe 
that in future thej would be welcomed only on more 
stringent conditions. 

In material matters the country had prospered 
during the period which we are now considering. 
The high protective tariff which, under the Eepub- 
lican regime^ had fostered enormous monopolies, 
with regularly recurring seasons of delusive pros- 
perity, of overproduction, of strikes, stoppages, and 
failures, and then of apparent prosperity again, had 
finally to give way to a more moderate scale of 
entry duties, enabling foreign wares to compete 
fairly on their own merits with our domestic prod- 
ucts. Throughout the Southern States there was 
especially noticeable an increased tolerance of senti- 
ment and a marked growth of manufacturing enter- 
prises. The effects of schooling began to be appar- 
ent among the negro population, who disappointed 
the expectations of many by proving themselves, 
for the most part, orderly and industrious citizens 
in the towns, and good workers in the rural dis- 
tricts. The spirit of wild speculation which had 
possessed the country after the close of the Seces- 
sion period received its death-blow in the disclosures 
made upon the trial of the swindlers who had in- 
veigled General Grant and his entire family to 
their financial ruin, and in the preventive legisla- 
tion enacted immediately thereafter. The paper 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AN^D CON-SEQUENCES. 17 

fortunes of the Goulds, tlie Yanderbilts, and the 
scores of other reputed millionaires of that day 
gradually shrunk to tlieir real values, hundreds of 
other supposed capitalists passed quietly out of 
sight, and a healthier view on the question of 
money-getting— in fact, of morals in general, took 
possession of the public mind. It was the inevi- 
table reaction from the extravagance and corruption 
invariably following a costly and successful war. 

The result of the Presidential election of 1888 
fairly astonished the country. 'No less than five 
electoral tickets had been placed in nomination. It 
was impossible, even up to the day of election, to 
predict the result, as the ^National Party had never 
yet polled its strength in a Presidential contest, 
while both the Democrats and Republicans kept up 
their customary blowing of trumpets about the 
walls of their political Jericho, so that no one knew 
what to expect. But when the result was an- 
nounced, it was found that the Democrats had car- 
ried New Jersey, South Carolina, and Mississippi, 
the Republicans Rhode Island and Yermont, and 
the l^ationals all the remaining States, with three 
hundred and ninety-one electoral votes out of a 
total of four hundred and twenty -four. It was a 
scathing rebuke to political schemers and corrup- 
tionists, an unmistakable declaration that the peo- 
ple were tired of ^^ machines" and ^'bosses," and 
had once more determined to govern themselves. 
The liquor power, too, had become so insolent in 
its demeanor and so corrupting in its influence on 
politics that there was a revolt of public sentiment 



18 " ^^BIETIGHEIM." 

against it, both North and South. The triumph 
of the National Party proved a death-blow to this 
domination as well. So overwhelming was the 
victory that the defeated parties, in the practical 
American spirit, accepted it with a good grace, and 
at once set about turning the new order of things 
to the best account possible. All patriotic people 
rejoiced in the unity of sentiment existing through- 
out the country, as well as in the consciousness that 
the minority, though divided on most issues, was 
yet large enough, when united in case of need, to 
make a vigorous opposition to any arbitrary or un- 
constitutional acts which the victorious majority 
might attempt. 

But no such attempt was to be made. On the 
4:th of March, 1889, when President Bayard deliv- 
ered his inaugural, not a cloud was visible on the 
political horizon. The voices of factions were 
stilled, peace and prosperity prevailed, and not even 
to the most sagacious observer was there any portent 
visible of the storm of excitement which within a 
twelvemonth was to burst upon the land. Re- 
lieved of the pressure of the overwhelming hordes 
of office-seekers, who under previous administra- 
tions had been wont to monoJ3olize the attention 
of the Executive, the President and his Cabinet 
were enabled to devote their time and energies to 
the consideration of the more important issues 
which presented themselves, such as the Public 
Lands and Forestry questions, the pitiable condition 
of the Northwestern Indian tribes, then being 
rapidly decimated by consumption and small-pox ; 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 19 

the feasibility of bridging the Mississippi at New 
Orleans ; the organization of the militia forces of 
the respective States upon a national basis ; and 
the devising of further means for extending our 
foreign trade througlF the agency of the consular 
service. These and other important measures would 
doubtless have taken form and shape in the Presi- 
dent's ensuing message to Congress, when, sud- 
denly, out of the midst of the clear sky fell the 
thunderbolt which awoke the country to the re- 
sponsibility that was upon it, and sent the cry for 
reparation or war ringing like a tocsin throughout 
the land. 

The act which provoked the first outburst of 
popular feeling was undoubtedly one of wanton 
cruelty and aggression. One Christian E-einhardt, 
a native of Germany, had emigrated to this country 
at the age of nineteen, and settled at Carson, Nev., 
where, five years later, he was made a citizen. He 
had also managed to amass suflicient money to pur- 
chase a modest home, and in the summer of 1889 
revisited his birthplace, Miilheim-on-tlie-Rhine, for 
the purpose of bringing back his widowed mother 
and only sister to share with him his home and for- 
tunes in the West. Immediately after his arrival he 
was ordered to report as a deserter from the Ger- 
man army. In reply he showed his passport as an 
American citizen. He was arrogantly informed 
that "that j^aper" was of no avail to him there, 
and that he must pay a fine or report for arrest 
within three days. He at once communicated the 
facts to the United States Consul at Cologne, who 



20 "bietigheim." 

in turn telegraphed them to Mr. Pendleton, our 
Minister at Berlin, who had already given much 
attention to such questions."^ As no diplomatic 
action could be taken in the matter until an arrest 
had been actually made, or* a fine collected, the 
Consul was instructed to go personally to Miilheim, 
and report promptly all that occurred. On the 
fourth day Reinhardt was, in the presence of the 
Consul, taken by force from his mother's house, by 
a file of soldiers, and, upon offering resistance to 
the arrest, was shot dead, passport in hand. The 
Consul, who denounced the act as a cold-blooded 
murder, and demanded the immediate arrest of the 
soldier, was set upon by a mob, and barely escaped 
with his life. On reaching Cologne he telegraphed 
the facts to the Legation ; Mr. Pendleton lost no 
time in calling at the German Foreign Ofiice to 
demand an immediate disclaimer of the outrage 
and a promise of prompt reparation, at the same 
time cabling to Washington a statement of the en- 
tire affair, and of his action. A reply from the 
President sustained his course, and instructed him 
to press his demand, and make no concessions. 
Upon one or another pretext, however, the Berlin 

* Word has been received that Minister Pendleton's study 
of the question of German-American citizenship and the viola- 
tion of its rights is going to result in the hearing of the com- 
plaints of German- Americans whose rights have been interfered 
with while visiting the fatherland, and that a remedy is to be 
provided if possible. Minister Pendleton's report on the sub- 
ject is expected at the Department of State early enough to 
afford a basis for a proposition for an amendment to the Ban- 
croft treaty.— TFas/imgrto/i (Z>. C.) Repuhlican, October 20ih, 1885. 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 21 

Government temporized, and after repeated calls at 
the Foreign Office our Minister was able to obtain 
nothing more satisfactory than vague assurances 
that an inquiry was being made concerning the 
affair. Meanwhile in America the excitement wa£ 
indescribable. In many places Bismarck was 
burned in effigy, the naturalized German element 
being foremost in the demonstrations. Mass-meet- 
ings were held everywhere. At one in St. Louis, 
where over fifty thousand attended, such transpar- 
encies as " Germany Must Apologize or Fight" 
and '' Reparation or War" were freely displayed. 
Cablegrams by the score and from every quarter of 
the land daily poured in upon the American Minis- 
ter at Berlin, urging him to stand firm at every cost. 
The newspapers teemed with instances of the arro- 
gance of German authorities toward naturalized 
Americans revisiting their native land ; it was dis- 
covered that thousands of similar complaints, under 
the title of " military cases," had been pigeon-holed 
at the Berlin Leo'ation throuo^h the indifference or 
sycophancy of former ministers ; ^ it came to light 



* EXPELLING AMERICANS. 
AFTKB HIS POLISH IMMOLATION, BISMARCK TURNS TO UNITED STATES 

CITIZENS. 

(Bp Cable to the Neco York Herald.) 
Beelin, November 11th, 1885. — The German-Americans who 
were recently expelled from the island of Foelir, Schleswig, 
have been ordered to leave Prussia before November 15th. 
Two naturalized Americans, natives of Tarp and Schottenburg, 
have also been ordered to leave, one by the end of November 
and the other by the end of the year. 

Beelin, December 11th, 1885. — The Vossiche Zeitung pub- 
lishes a letter from Schleswig in reference to President Cleve- 



22 ^^BIETIGHEIM." 

that previous administrations liad been vainly ap- 
pealed to to right outrageous wrongs of this char- 
acter ; and that several well-known members of 
Congress, now among the loudest for war, had been 
requested to bring similar acts of arrogance to the 
notice of the House of Representatives, jet, for 
some reason, had neglected to do so. But now the 
long smouldering fire of indignation against Ger- 
man arrogance blazed up into a fierce flame ; the 
return of the Lasker resolutions, and the unciWl 
treatment received by a former Minister at the Ger- 
man court, Mr. Sargent, were revived in the public 
mind ; and to fan the flame, cojDies and translations 
of Bismarck's speech in the Reichstag on the 
former question were printed on tissue paper and 
circulated by hundreds of thousands among the 
people. 

The popular demand for immediate action de- 
cided the President to call an extra session of Con- 
gress. The shooting of Reinhardt had occurred 
late in August ; on the 12th of September Mr. 

land's Message. In alluding to that part of tlie Message re- 
garding an apparent tendency on the part of the Imperial 
Government to extend the scope of the residential restric- 
tions to which returning naturalized citizens of German 
origin are asserted to be liable under the laws of the Empire, 
the writer says : " The German Government treats alike, 
regardless of where naturalized, all Germans who emigrate in 
order to escape military service and then return to Germany. 
The Government will not tolerate American or Danish colonies 
within its territory. The Schleswig expulsion edict is a warn- 
ing for those liable to military service if seized with a desire to 
emigrate and then return to Germany as naturalized citizens 
of another country." — New Twk Tribune. 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 23 

Pendleton demanded his passports, bade farewell to 
the German Court, and withdrew to London to 
await further developments. Congress assembled 
on the first Monday in October. So eager had been 
the response to the President's summons, that only 
three Senators and less than twenty members of the 
House failed to answer when their names ^vere 
called. The organization of both branches was 
promptly effected. Meanwhile popular feeling 
was so intense that eager crowds gathered before 
the telegraph offices and bulletin boards in all the 
larger cities and towns. At Washington the Cap- 
itol was besieged by a shouting populace, requiring 
a strong force of police and militia to keep open 
even a passage for the entrance and egress of mem- 
bers. The President's Message was read in execu- 
tive session to the assembled bodies amid profound 
silence. It was temperate in tone, and after recit- 
ing all the details of the Peinhardt affair, supported 
by a mass of correspondence, telegraphic and other- 
wise, submitted the case to the sovereign represent- 
atives of the people for such action as might be 
deemed '' just, dignified, and best befitting the 
honor of a great nation." 

'No sooner had the reading ended than a score of 
members were on their feet demanding to be heard ; 
but among them there was no voice for peace, nor 
even for arbitration. The cooler-headed members 
kej^t their senses and their seats, w^aiting for the 
storm of excited oratory to pass, and for the mo- 
ment to arrive when the question of declaring war 
against the most powerful military empire in the 



24 '^BIETIGHEIM." 

world might be discussed with dignity and calm- 
ness. While all were unanimous in agreeing that 
an insult had been offered for which full reparation 
must be demanded, the views as to how that repa- 
ration could best be obtained were so conflicting that 
a continuous session of nearly forty-eight hours had 
been held without result, when, to the surprise of 
all, a second message from the President was an- 
nounced. It transmitted a cable dispatch from the 
Government of Great Britain, offering the media- 
tion and arbitration of Queen Victoria, if by that 
means hostilities could be averted. 

The proposition served to divide the members, 
and thus fortunately to prevent a hasty and intem- 
perate declaration of war. From the members rep- 
resenting Irish constituencies it met, of course, 
with opposition the most bitter. The debate was 
renewed with added vigor, while the crowds which 
still thronged the corridors and grounds of the Cap- 
itol, being informed of the new phase of the ques- 
tion, also became divided in sentiment, and gave 
now cheers, now hisses for England and the Queen. 
The press took up the arbitration question in most 
instances favorably, and these opinions, coming back 
by telegraph to different Senators and representa- 
tives, influenced to some extent their own views. 
Every parliamentary means was resorted to by the 
opposing factions to defer a direct vote until one or 
the other could be certain of a majority, and it was 
only after the session had reached its fourth day 
that a call of the Yeas and ISTays on the question of 
accepting Great Britain's offer resulted in an 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 25 

affirmative decision by a scant majority of five. 
The country acquiesced, though at first rehictantly. 
Gradually, however, the wisdom of the course 
adopted impressed itself upon the public mind, 
while general confidence was felt in the fairness and 
impartiality of the chosen arbiter. 

The Council of Arbitration met at London early 
in January, 1890, the United States being repre- 
sented by Dr. Woolsey, of Yale University, a 
recognized authority in international law ; Hon. 
William M. Evarts, the most brilliant legal mind 
of that day, and Senator Randall Gibson, of Loui- 
siana, a man who, though much younger than the 
other two, possessed tried political sagacity and 
many accomplishments. Germany sent Count 
Ilatzfeld, one of her former ministers to the Court 
of St. James, Count Munster, an exceedingly able 
diplomat, and Herbert Bismarck, a son of the 
Chancellor. The Prince of Wales presided over 
the council as representative of his royal mother. 
The attitude of Germany, if not arrogant, was cer- 
tainly not conciliatory. While feigning regret for 
the tragical issue of the Reinhardt incident, she 
took the ground that it had resulted from his offer- 
ing personal resistance to lawful military authority ; 
and that as he had been answerable for military 
service to the German Empire prior to his acquiring 
American citizenship, such citizenship could not 
be recognized by the German Empire until the 
prior obligation had been discharged. This pres- 
entation of the case caused the excitement in 
America to break out afresh, and greatly strength- 



26 ^^BIETIGHEIM." 

ened the cause of the opponents of arbitration. 
Many openly urged a recall of the delegates to the 
council and an immediate declaration of war. Yet 
Congress, though by a bare majority, stood firm 
in the course it had chosen, and it has since been 
generally conceded as certain that had the Council 
of Arbitration been permitted to complete its work, 
the verdict would have been favorable to the claim 
of the United States. But before it had been in 
session for a month other great events intervened 
to put an abrupt end to its proceedings and to pre- 
cipitate that general European conflict which to all 
observant minds had, though long and oft deferred, 
seemed in the end inevitable. 

Let us now turn for awhile to a consideration of 
the events which had been transpiring in the Old 
World contemporaneously with those which we 
have been describing in the New. Where so many 
thousands of soldiers were constantly kept under 
arms, and where so many disturbing elements ex- 
isted, requiring all the tact and statecraft of public 
men to prevent collisions or outbreaks, it seems in- 
deed wonderful that the clash of arms was so long 
averted. Chief among these constant causes for 
disquietude were the Cerman colonial policy, w^iich 
proved aggressive in its character ; England's con- 
stant irritation against Russia on account of the lat- 
ter' s stealthy but steady encroachments on her 
Northern Indian frontier ; Russia's unceasing in- 
trigues in the Balkan Peninsula ; France's watch- 
ful eagerness to avenge Sedan and recover Alsace 
and Lorraine ; the commercial jealousies engendered 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 27 

in tlie opening np of the Congo Free State ; and 
lastly, the spread of the Socialist movement, en- 
dangering, in case of a general war, the safety of 
every capital in Europe. But of all these ques- 
tions, the one probably most calculated to keep 
Europe in a constant ferment was Russia's ambition 
to drive the Sultan from Europe, and gain control 
of the Dardanelles. The treaty of San Stefano 
and the action of the Berlin Conference had but 
served as temporary delays in the prosecntion of 
this plan ; and when, in 1885, Bulgaria and Hou- 
melia proclaimed their independence as a united 
kingdom, although the voice that spoke was that of 
a Bulgarian Jacob, the hand was but too ]3lainly 
that of a Russian Esau. The impoverished condi- 
tion of the Turkish treasury and the discontent 
and corruption existing in official circles at Con- 
stantinople contributed still further to stimulate 
Russia's sleepless ambition. An outbreak, in fact, 
occurred in 188T, which well-nigh assumed the 
proportions of a revolution, and which was only 
suppressed by the most prompt and severe meas- 
ures. In the following year an unsuccessful at- 
tempt was made upon the Sultan's life by one of 
his most trusted advisers, who was afterward 
shown to have been one of a band of conspirators, 
many of whom were discovered and summarily put 
to death. In short, the crescent was waning, and 
the downfall of the Mohammedan power in Europe 
had come to be looked upon as certain to ensue 
whenever the course of events should afford Russia 
the slightest pretext for a renewal of hostilities. 



38 '^BIETIGHEIM." 

As far back as 1880 Bismarck's attempt to divert 
the stream of German emigration into colonial 
channels had begun to make itself apparent. That 
some outlet must be foand for the overcrowded 
populations of the Fatherland was plain ; and it 
was the great statesman's aim to found in various 
quarters of the globe colonies where German emi- 
grants, while finding all the land they required, 
might still remain German citizens and dwell under 
the same monarchical influences which had sur- 
rounded them at home. The hundreds of thou- 
sands who had gone to the United States and had 
there acquired citizenship, with a republican free- 
dom of thought, speech, and action, constituted an 
element of antagonism to monarchy which, though 
the Atlantic rolled between, could not but make its 
influence keenly felt upon the thought and temper 
of the German middle and lower classes at home — 
an influence which found voice in the growing 
strength and boldness of the Democratic party in 
the Reichstag. Warned by this spread of ideas 
which in time must inevitably undermine the 
throne, Bismarck shrewdly set about providing 
colonial possessions where, under home protection, 
German industry and thrift might, instead of being 
lost to the Fatherland, only serve to increase its 
power and influence, and expand its realm.* To 



*BISMABCK's TEBRITOEIAIi DESIGNS — EAISING THE GEBMAN FLAG 
IN THE SOUTHEBN PACIFIC. 

San Feancisco, Cal., December 21st, 1885. — Private advices 
by the steamer Oceanic, wbicli arrived here on Saturday from 
China, state that the German man-of-war Nautilus has raised 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AJS'D CONSEQUENCES. 29 

this spirit was due the cordial support accorded to 
the Congo Free State project by calling together 
tlie Congo Conference at Berlin ; the attempt to 
plant the German flag on the Caroline Islands, en- 
gendering an. enmity on the part of Spain which, 
as we shall see later, bore bitter fruits ; the per- 
sistent encroachments of German traders in Japan, 
China, and the Corea ; and the notorious failure 
to establish a colony in Southern Brazil, whence, 
after the expenditure of half a million dollars and 
many lives, the survivors were glad to return to 
Germany at any price. 

Meanwhile, notwithstanding the restriction upon 
immigration, which began to be freely talked of in 
the United States, Germans had continued flocking 
thither by thousands annually, and the schemes of 
Bismarck not only practically failed of their object, 
but, worse still, succeeded in engendering in Eng- 
land, Belgium, Holland, Spain, and Italy a sense 
of deep popular irritation against the arbitrary spirit 
in which it had been attempted to carry them out. 
It may, in short, be said that by this and various 
other means Germany had, by the arrival of the 
year 1890, succeeded in rendering herself the most 
unpopular — in fact, the worst-hated nation in Eu- 



the German flag on the Marshall and Gilbert groups of islands, 
in the Southern Pacific, and claimed for the government a pro- 
tectorate over them. These islands number about fifty in all. 
The natives are said to be civilized and to have been for many- 
years under the influence of the American Missionary Society. 
Further particulars are expected by the Australian steamer due 
here on December 28th. 



30 *' BIETIGHEIM." 

rope. Still, she remained unquestionably the most 
powerful. The iron hand of military power kept 
down all disaffection and maintained German unity 
intact, notwithstanding the ominous signs of revolt 
against Berlin despotism, coming now from Baden, 
now from Bavaria or Wiirtemberg, now from one 
or another of the numerous Duchies or Principali- 
ties attached to the triumphal chariot of Prussia. 
The Emperor William's openly expressed desire 
that Germany should preserve the peace of Europe 
during the remainder of his lifetime was fortu- 
nately fulfilled, and the sunset of the grand old sol- 
dier's days proved indeed as tranquil and calm as 
their morning and noon had been fitful and stormy. 
It is related that one day during the closing years 
of his life he had gone to a chapel connected with 
the Berlin Dom for the purpose of inspecting an 
allegorical painting, which represents the kings of 
the earth depositing their emblems of royalty at the 
feet of the Saviour. The court preacher addressed 
the monarch, who made the following reply : 
''What you have said to me personally 1 accept 
with all modesty, as a man whose days in this world 
are numbered. During my long life, and especially 
of late years, Heav^en has showered many blessings 
and mercies upon me ; but the worldly homage paid 
me I deposit on the throne of the Most High, who 
gives us the strength to accomplish whatever good 
we can do in the world." Could the monarch who 
gave utterance to such sentiments as these have only 
been spared for a few years longer, who can say 
what influence his presence and exam]3le might not 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 31 

liave thrown into tlie scale to preserve peace and 
avert that tremendous conflict the causes of which 
we are now considering ! But he had reached a 
ripe old age, and the grim messenger wlio knocks 
impartially at the peasant's hut and the palace gate 
hrought him at last his summons. From that mo- 
ment began a new era in the history of Germany. 
From the day that Frederick ascended the throne, 
the star of Bismarck was in its descendant, and with 
it waned the brilliant sun that had shone over 
united Germany. First came the quarrel of Baden 
with Bavaria concerning the latter's small strip of 
territory on the Rhine ; then the renewal of the 
Brunswick succession question, and finally the ridic- 
ulous frontier dispute between Wiirtemberg and 
Hohenzollern, which by the beginning of 1890 had 
assumed a national importance and threatened a 
disruption of friendly relations between Wiirtem- 
berg and Prussia, had not events of far greater 
weight compelled both contestants to lay aside their 
minor differences and make common cause against 
a common foe. 

To at least one nation in Europe these evidences 
of internal dissension in Germany were auguries of 
the dawn of a day long awaited. Although nearly 
two decades had obliterated all traces of the battle- 
field of Sedan, the memory of its disgrace still 
rankled in the heart of every Frenchman.. Every 
French mother who brought forth a boy conse- 
crated him with his first breath as a soldier to 
Fi'ance, and taught him with his first prayer at her 
knee to hsp the w^atchword '^ a has les Pricssiens.'''' 



32 **BIETIGHEIM." 

During all the years that had elapsed, none ever 
acknowledged that the battle for Alsace and Lor- 
raine was ended : it was only a prolonged truce, 
during which the temporarily prostrated contestant 
was gathering fresh strength for a renewal of the 
deadly struggle. The female statue representing 
the city of Strasburg, on the Place de la Concorde 
at Paris, was tenderly draped with emblems of 
mourning every year by the populace, as that of a 
loved sister in captivity. Since the restoration of 
peace and the establishment of the republic France 
had prospered incredibly. With the exception of 
the quixotic hostilities in Tonquin, she had con- 
trived to hold aloof from foreign complications. 
The Presidential election of 1886, to which many 
timid ones had looked forward with misgiving, had 
been safely passed ; Bonapartism had met its death- 
blow from a Zulu spear in South Africa ; and even 
the Poyalist element had begun to concede tacitly 
that the republic was, at least for years to come, a 
fixed fact. The stern and prompt suppression of 
the Radical uprising at Lyons late in 1887 showed 
not only that the Republican leaders were in ear- 
nest, but that they had the support of the people and 
of the army, and were in a position to cope suc- 
cessfully with the dangerous elements in their own 
party. The enthusiastic reception given to Presi- 
dent Grevy on the occasion of his visit in 1887 to the 
United States, to attend an international celebra- 
tion in honor of the statue of " Liberty" in ]^ew 
York Harbor, and the friendly tone of his speeches 
during his journey and after his return, had served 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 33 

to cement the brotherly relations between the two 
countries, so happily inaugurated bj Lafayette and 
Kochambeau, and had resulted in the framing of a 
special and reciprocal tariff treaty between the two 
governments, under which French wines and silks 
were admitted on a reduced duty, in return for 
similar privileges accorded to our wheat, pork, 
canned goods, and agricultural imj)lements at 
French custom houses. 

As may be imagined, Germany looked upon this 
rapprochement between the United States and her 
traditionary enemy with no friendly eye, the more 
so as some of the more indiscreet of the mosquito 
press of Paris, with Gallic childishness, began 
loudly hinting at a possible alliance, both offensive 
and defensive, with the United States, in case of 
an attempt to recover the lost provinces on the 
Rhine. So offensive, in fact, did these utterances 
become, that the German Minister, von Schlozer, 
felt obliged to bring them officially to the notice of 
the French Government, and to request a disavowal. 
The offending journalists were promptly punished 
by the infliction of trifling fines, but not until pop- 
ular sentiment had had a good opportunity of dis- 
playing its full sympathy with the ideas suggested. 
About this time everything American became again 
as popular at Paris as it had been in the days of 
Franklin and Adams. The caprices of the good 
people of the giddy French capital found expres- 
sion, for instance, in naming a number of the boule- 
vards after the leading cities of the Union. The 

Avenue de la Grande Eepublique" became the 



(( 



34 **BIETIGHEIM." 

''Avenue des denx Grandes Repiibliques," and 
the " Rue Bayard " the '' Rue President Bayard." 
The works of the leading American authors were 
translated and read with avidity. Barrett, tlie 
American tragedian, was accorded the honor of 
appearing as Cassius in Shakespeare's Julius CcBsar 
on the boards of the Comedie Frangaise, supported 
by an American company ; and although the Eng- 
lish text was used, the house was thronged, and dis- 
tinguished honors were heaped upon the player. In 
the official world a similar feeling prevailed. The 
action of the French ministry in refusing M. de 
Lesseps's extraordinary demands for protection in 
his hour of need was unquestionably a concession 
to America's openly avowed opposition to the 
project. Nor only this. The French Government, 
by order of the National Assembly, sent commis- 
sions to this country to study and report on our sys- 
tem of agriculture, of public education, of canals 
and railroads, and of telegraphy. In the United 
States these substantial proofs of respect and friend- 
liness were appreciated, and met in a similar though 
perhaps less demonstrative spirit. But the day was 
soon to come when the alliance thus begun was to 
prove of greater significance and value than the 
world at large, which had been inclined to regard it 
as a mere accident, had ever anticipated. 

Among the other causes of disquietude in Europe 
to which reference has been made was the strife 
for commercial supremacy in the then newly organ- 
ized Congo Free State. There existed at that time 
a general belief that Europeans could, with proper 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 35 

precaTition, become acclimated in that region, and 
the opening of the Congo to foreign trade was re- 
garded as only the preliminary step to the peopling 
of all Central Africa by the Caucasian race, to the 
ultimate extinction of the African tribes. Unfor- 
tunately time had not yet demonstrated the vision- 
ary nature of these expectations, and so the rush 
for the Congo began. Capital was subscribed with- 
out difficulty for the construction of the railway 
around the rapids from Yivi to Stanley-Pool. Yivi 
and Leopoldville, from insignificant native villages 
with a few barracks built by European pioneers, 
grew ra23idly to be commercial towns, the one with 
twelve, the other with seven thousand white inhab- 
itants. Enormous warehouses were put up at vari- 
ous points along the stream, and in these were stored 
stocks of merchandise and provisions far in excess 
of the demands of the market. Before long it be- 
gan to be painfully apparent that the resources of 
the country, present or prospective, were far from 
adequate to repay the capital already invested.* 
Yet Europe was slow to accept the idea of a failure, 
and everything possible was done to bolster up pub- 
lic confidence in the future of Congo trade. Stock 
comj)anies, based on inaccessible mines, impossible 
railways, and untenable tracts of farming and graz- 

* New Yoke, December 2d, 1885. — It is believed that the reso- 
lutions of the Berlin Conference in respect to the Congo will 
be sent to Congress with adverse comments by President Cleve- 
land on the ground that the climate and resources of that part 
of Africa are not favorable to commerce, and that the United 
States are indisposed to engage in entangling alliances. — 
London Standard. 



36 *'BIETIGHEIM." 

ing land were organized, and the bourses of Europe 
were flooded with the shares. International jeal- 
ousies and rivalries kept the settlers themselves in a 
constant qaarrel, and the absence of any authority 
competent to preserve order over so vast a territory 
caused much the same condition of society as that 
which existed here in our Western territory a cen- 
tury ago. Notwithstanding the strictest regulations 
on paper, quantities of gunpowder and alcohol 
passed into the hands of the natives, who, at flrst 
disposed to be friendly and peaceable, soon became 
mistrustful, then vindictive, and finally openly hos- 
tile. The quarrels among the settlers were constant 
and serious. If an Englishman was killed by a 
Portuguese, or if an Italian stilettoed some un- 
offending Hollander, there would ensue a lengthy 
diplomatic correspondence between their respective 
home governments, but that was all. Germans 
would by force of numbers succeed in ousting Bel- 
gians from some good trading nook on the river ; 
the latter would move farther up or down the 
stream, and in turn oust some party of Englishmen 
less numerous than they ; and the Englishmen per- 
haps resisting, there would be bloodshed, and who 
was to right the wrong ? For a time it kept all 
Europe in hot water, until, in the presence of greater 
events, the Congo commerce dropped temporarily 
out of notice, and the settlers were left to fight it 
out with the climate, the natives, and each other as 
best they could. 

Meanwhile over all Europe hovered the dark, in- 
tangible spectre which, under the various names of 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 37 

''Nihilism," ''Socialism," "Communism," etc., 
was threatening war not upon any particular gov- 
ernment, but upon all government, upon society, 
upon religion, upon the family tie, upon all that we 
have been taught to hold sacred and dear. Silent, 
yet vigilant ; unseen, yet ceaselessly active, it re- 
sembled some monster serpent, coiled for a spring, 
and encircling all Europe in its slimy folds. For 
long years it had been content to limit its ghastly 
work to assassination. At one time it would at- 
tempt the life of an obnoxious monarch ; at another, 
aim its pistol at some Cabinet minister, or again 
strike down a trusty police official, whose vigilance 
had proved an obstacle to the carrying out of its 
hellish plots. There is reason for believing tliat 
the secret police of the various leading governments 
at that period were thoroughly advised in regard to 
the nature and strength of the various socialist or- 
ganizations, and regularly informed of their pro- 
ceedings and projects. It was this Argus-eyed vig- 
ilance which kept the revolutionists in abeyance so 
long as peace prevailed ; while, on the other hand, 
that society was living upon the thin crust of a 
volcano, which might at any time belch forth fire 
and blood, was a fact to which rulers could not be 
blind. Finally, in self-defence, each nation re- 
sorted to the expulsion of all foreign Socialists from 
its territory, thus hemming them in within the 
boundaries of the countries to which they respec- 
tively belonged. This, to some extent, simpliiied 
the problem, and enabled the police to localize the 
elements with which they had to deal, and to keep 



38 *< BIETIGHEIM.'' 

every suspected or dangerous individual where tliey 
could laj hand on him, if need be, at a moment's 
notice. Yet, in spite of all this surveillance, Social- 
ism grew and prospered, and assassination went on 
as before. Sometimes the perpetrators were dis- 
covered, sometimes not. Those who were discov- 
ered, tried, and convicted often boastfully avowed 
their guilt in open court, and defying their judges, 
went to execution with a smile upon their lips. In 
this fanatical desperation, this misguided heroism, 
prompting thousands of able-bodied men in every 
land in Europe to stand ready, on the simple draw- 
ing of a lot, to take their lives in their hands and 
go to almost certain death in carrying out the behest 
of the order, every European Grovernment recog- 
nized an adversary which threatened to become in 
time more formidable than the armies and navies 
of its neighbors. It was a fierce tiger crouching, 
and ready to spring so soon as, by any chance, the 
hand which held the chain sliould relax its grasp. 

England had perhaps been the greatest sufferer 
among all the European powers at the hands of 
these desperate revolutionists. 'Not to mention the 
constant effort made by the Irish, or Fenians, as 
they were then called, to embroil her with the 
United States, she also had to undergo, for a long 
series of years, dastardly attempts to blow up her 
public buildings by means of explosives, or to 
lay London and her other large cities in ashes. 
Scarcely had the excitement attending the attempt 
to blow up the Tower and the Houses of Parhament 
died out of the public mind, when a plan to destroy 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 39 

"Windsor Castle was discovered and Jiappily frus- 
trated. In September, 1887, great fires broke out 
simultaneously in many quarters of London, and 
while the flames were yet unsubdued, the telegraph 
brought intelligence that conflagrations were raging 
in Birmingham, ShefSeld, Hull, Manchester, and. 
Liverpool. The losses occasioned by these fires 
aggregated upward of twenty millions of pounds ; 
and although the Government failed to prove that 
they were the result of a joint conspiracy, nobody 
ever doubted that fact. Many of the incendiaries 
were caught, and every one of them proved to be 
an Irishman. Though all were convicted and sen- 
tenced to death or penal servitude, they all, without 
exception, strenuously maintained to the end that 
they knew nothing of each other's acts. 

In 1888 a similar attempt was made, but vigi- 
lance and promptitude prevented its resulting in any 
serious harm. On the last occasion, however, as if 
by preconcerted action, the people of every large 
city in England arose en onasse^ outraged beyond 
expression at these cowardly acts, and demanded the 
expulsion of every Irishman not an avowed sup- 
porter of the English Government. The sturdy 
British patience was exhausted, and every disloyal 
Irishman was given one week in which to leave 
England for good. In some places those who 
were known as violent antagonists of the Govern- 
ment were soundly beaten and sent out by force, 
but in the main the expulsion proceeded quietly, 
and within ten days England was rid of hundreds 
of troublesome agitators and conspirators, most of 



40 " BIETIGHEIM." 

whom sailed for America. Our Government, how- 
ever, took energetic action, and treated them as 
political criminals to the extent of requiring as a 
condition of each one's landing that he should fur- 
nish bonds to preserve the international peace ; 
this the most of them happily failed to do, and 
were consequently obliged to return to Europe or 
to scatter to Mexico and South America, where 
they were heard of no more. Strong British garri- 
sons meanwhile occupied the principal centres of 
disloyalty in Ireland ; for a time there were at- 
tempted assassinations and occasional outbreaks, but 
the Conservative Party, which had returned to 
power in 1887, was determined to deal with Ireland 
with an iron hand, and results proved the wisdom 
of its course. By the close of 1889 Ireland had 
come to be better governed and more tranquil than 
ever before under English rule. To this result 
the loyal assistance of the Roman Catholic clergy 
and the co-operation of the United States Grovern- 
ment in suppressing Fenian plots on American soil 
had contributed to a large extent ; the later fact 
had, moreover, cemented the bonds of brotherhood 
between the two great English-speaking nations of 
the earth, and it was the current remark of that 
period that Great Britain and the United States 
combined would be able to dictate either peace or 
war to the entire continent of Europe. The inter- 
change of friendly visits between the two countries 
by the distinguished men of each was constant. 
In 1887 the Prince of Wales, accompanied by his 
second son, revisited the United States, and was 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 41 

received with an enthusiasm surpassing, if anything, 
that which had marked his first visit thither when a 
mere youth. Ex-President Cleveland's reception 
in London, in 1889, was not less cordial, the prince 
accompanying him in an open barouche, through 
crowded streets, from the Mansion House to the 
Parliament Buildings. I find in an illustrated paper 
of that period — it is called a '^ comic'' paper — a 
cartoon entitled '' The Modern Siamese Twins," 
representing John Bull and Brother Jonathan, in 
their traditional character costumes, standing linked 
together by a ligament of flesh and blood on which 
is inscribed '' We Are One." 

It is not necessary to detain you here by narrat- 
ing in detail the history of Great Britain's varied 
foreign relations during the decade immediately 
preceding the war of 1890. A nation with so many 
and so widely dispersed foreign possessions, and 
whose drum taps, as it was then the Briton's pride 
to boast, daily followed the sun around the globe, 
was almost constantly finding itself engaged in some 
foreign war or another. The campaigns in South 
Africa, in the Soudan, in Burmah, in Ceylon ; the 
desperate uprising among the hill tribes of India in 
1887, and the French Canadian outbreak about the 
same period, growing out of the execution of the 
half-breed Riel two years before — all these kept 
England's army busy, but without adding a square 
foot of territory to her possessions. Behind all 
lurked the spectre of Hussia's crafty ambition to 
secure the approaches to the north-western frontier 
of India. Notwithstanding that Lord Salisbury's 



42 '^ BIETIGHEIM." 

prudent statesmanship had succeeded, in 1885, in 
estabhshing a boundarj-line for Afghanistan which, 
it was fondly hoped, would prove an effectual and 
permanent barrier to further encroachments, Rus- 
sia within a twelvemonth renewed her insidious 
practice of advancing her foreposts, now on this 
pretext, now on that, here bj bribery, there by 
force, until the time came when her foothold was 
certain, and concealment was no longer necessary. 
Then the mask was thrown boldly off, and one 
morning in January, 1890, the telegraph flashed the 
news abroad to the world that a Russian army corps 
had occupied Herat. 

The act was tantamount to a declaration of war. 
England promptly accepted the challenge, and set 
on foot war ]3reparations on an enormous scale. 
The long-cherished hatred of Russia which burned 
in every Englishman's heart was aroused to open 
action by this sudden and unexpected act of treach- 
ery. But while both nations were arming and put- 
ting forth all their energies for the deadly conflict 
certain to ensue, the telegraph brought another 
startling announcement. A Russian frigate, while 
passing through the Dardanelles, had been fired 
into and sunk by the Turks. Thus England 
found an unexpected ally. Diplomatic relations 
between Constantinople and St. Petersburg Were at 
once cut off, and Russia threw an overwhelming 
force of her own and Roumanian troops across the 
Danube into Bulgaria. Austria followed suit by 
sending two army corps to Servia and Bosnia, and 
concentrating a large fleet of war ships at Trieste. 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 43 

Tliis move aroused still greater indignation in Great 
Britain, and Austria's policy was universally con- 
demned. People recalled the famous remark made 
by Mr. Gladstone a few years before. '' Take," 
said he, '^ a map of the woi*ld and show me, if you 
can, one spot of earth upon it where Austria has ever 
done any good." But it was not with England 
alone that Austria had now to reckon. Italy called 
upon her for an explanation of the menacing arma- 
ment at Trieste, and France promptly backed up 
the demand by officially expressing a hope that 
Austria's explanation would prove to be of a con- 
ciliatory and satisfactory character. Meanwhile all 
eyes were turned upon Germany, anxious to learn 
what course she would pursue. Nor did they re- 
main long in uncertainty. The action of France 
provoked much comment at Berlin, and a week 
afterward large bodies of German troops had oc- 
cupied Alsace-Lorraine, with heavy reserves on the 
Rhine and along the Swiss frontier. 

All this frantic hurrying to arms had been the 
work of less than a month. It was late in January 
when the Russians occupied Herat, yet before 
March had opened two thirds of Europe was under 
arms and ready for conflict. 

But even at this critical moment, while it was 
not yet too late, there came from the great Repub- 
lic of the West, beyond the sea, a voice pleading 
for peace, in the name of humanity and Chris- 
tianity. The Senate and House of Representatives 
of the United States, then in Congress assembled, 
adopted and transmitted to the several Great Powers 



44 '' BIETIGHEIM." 

of Europe, through the Department of State and 
their respective representatives at Washington, that 
famous " Appeal for Peace " which has ever since 
taken rank, side by side with the Declaration of In- 
dependence, among th^ memorable State documents 
in the world's archives. To you, my hearers, who 
have heard this document recited so often, and who 
have, many of you, declaimed it from the school 
rostrum in your boyhood's days, it is unnecessary 
that I should repeat it here. But its calm, unim- 
passioned utterances, its powerful portrayal of the 
dire consequences of war, as contrasted with the 
beneficent blessings of peace, and its noble offer to 
waive for the moment on the part of the United 
States the pending dispute with Germany, if by so 
doing the former country could mediate as an im- 
partial arbitrator between the Powers in conflict — all 
these stand out in bright letters of light in your 
memory, as the golden hues of a sunset which pre- 
ceded a dark and terrible night of storm. 

But alas ! the appeal was vain ; ifc fell upon deaf 
or unheeding ears. An English fleet was already 
on its way to the North Sea, and Turkish troops 
had already met with a serious repulse on the Ser- 
vian frontier. Austria had returned a haughty reply 
to Italy's demand, and both the latter country and 
France were in a ferment, and hurrying troops to 
their respective frontiers. 

It was at this juncture that the Joint Council of 
Arbitration then in session in London for the settle- 
ment of the pending dispute between Germany and 
the United States was brought to an abrupt termi- 



ITS CAUSEC, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 45 

nation by England's withdrawal from the position 
of arbiter. Mnch as this step was to be regretted, it 
was, under the circumstances, clearly unavoidable, 
for Germany no longer concealed her intention to 
side witli Russia and Austria, her copartners in the 
Tri-Imperial Alliance. The withdrawal created lit- 
tle surprise, for it had been foreseen from the mo- 
ment the German troops had begun to move toward 
the Rhine ; but it revived anew in the United States 
the excitement and the indignation against Ger- 
many, a feeling which was stimulated by great gen- 
eral sympathy with France, and a sense of brother- 
hood with England in her impending struggle. 
The disposition of Congress, however, so far as tak- 
ing any immediate action against Germany was con- 
cerned, may be inferred from the proposition con- 
veyed in the ^^ Appeal for Peace" — viz., to waive 
our differences with Germany for the time being, in 
order to eifect a bloodless settlement of the greater 
questions then pending on the Continent. But the 
German Government's subsequent action toward us 
rudely dispelled the last remnant of this conciliatory 
feeling. It is stated that when the '' Appeal for 
Peace" had been read in the Reichstag, Bismarck 
retorted with a sneer, '^ Good ! Let the Americans 
wait ; we can attend to them afterward ; for the 
present we have more important business." 

At the same time numerous complaints came in 
by cable to the State Department in behalf of Ger- 
man-Americans who had been arbitrarily impressed 
into the German ranks and sent off to the front. 
These high-handed acts, coupled with the Chancel- 



4G ** BIETIGHEIM." 

lor's sneer, laslied tlie people of tlie United States 
into a furj, and scattered forbearance to the winds. 
Many leading Congressmen wlio had liitlierto fa- 
vored every honorable sacrifice for the maintenance 
of peace were now loudest in asserting that the 
moment had arrived for prompt and decisive action. 
The country was clamorous for war, and thousands 
of volunteers stood ready in every State in the 
Union, waiting to offer themselves for military ser- 
vice so soon as the Government should make a call. 
On the 8tli of March Congress resolved almost 
unanimously — there were but ten dissentient votes 
— ^' that war be and the same is hereby declared to 
exist between the Empire of Germany and the de- 
pendencies thereof and the United States of 
America and their territories.' ' The President was 
empowered to raise and equip an army of three 
hundred thousand volunteers ; to employ all the 
land and naval forces of the United States for the 
prosecution of the war ; to issue letters of marque ; 
and to call for such public loans as might be neces- 
sary for executing this authorization. 

Such was the temper of the people, that within a 
week after the issue of President Bayard's procla- 
mation the quota of each State was filled, and half 
a million men liad volunteered for active service. 
Camps of instruction were established at every 
State capital, whither the quotas, as fast as en- 
listed, were sent to be placed under military disci- 
pline and drill. The supreme command was given 
to General Howard, who established his headquar- 
ters at Louisville, Ky., and at once proceeded to 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AT^D CONSEQUENCES. 47 

take steps for the organization of tlie immense army 
of raw troops which he found under him. In the 
acGomphshment of this task lie had the invaUiable 
assistance of thousands of veteran sokliers both in 
the North and South who had seen service in the 
War of Secession, and wlio, though now past the 
mihtarj age, Avere jet active in every State in giv- 
ing instruction to the new troops. 

The fever of excitement which had possessed the 
country before war had been dechired now gave 
phice to a cahn, resokite quiet and determination. As 
yet it was generally believed that the army would 
only be required for purposes of defence, in garri- 
soning the frontiers and sea-coasts, and that what- 
ever active warfare was carried on would be done 
by the navy alone. None at first thought of ag- 
gressive inilitary measures against Germany. Ey 
the middle of April the new trooj^s were in readi- 
ness to move. The country was divided into four 
military departments, with headquarters respec- 
tively at Burlington, Yt. ; Baltimore, Md. ; Hous- 
ton, Tex. ; and San Francisco, Cal. , with the 
troops so stationed in each as to be available to repel 
attempted invasion at any point. Active measures 
were at the same time taken to strengthen the sea- 
coast defences and the frontier forts, especially along 
the Mexican border, for our relations with Mexico 
at that time, owing to recent outrages by predatory 
bands on the Rio Grande, were such that it was 
considered as quite possible that a German military 
force might land at Yera Cruz and march upon us 
inland from that quarter. By the 1st of May the 



48 '' BIETIGHEIM.*' 

greater part of tlie military preparations were dis- 
posed of and the troops in positions in the respec- 
tive departments. Our navy in the mean time had 
already won brilliant honors. Thanks to the fore- 
sight of President Cleveland, whose recommenda- 
tions to Congress in 1885 had borne good fruit, our 
naval armament had been brought np to a condition 
where it could rank with the other great navies of 
the world. Within a month after the declaration 
of war two German merchantmen were brought into 
Philadelphia with prize crews on board, and a naval 
engagement took place off the English coast between 
the German frigate Kaiser Fritz and the United 
States ironclad Adirondack, resulting in the dis- 
abling and consequent surrender of the former ves- 
sel. 

But while these events were transpiring at home 
and on the sea, all Europe was in a continued fer- 
ment. France had declared war on Germany with- 
out waiting for Italy's action, and a sharp engage- 
ment had already taken place on the Alsatian frontier 
at Avricourt. The Tri-Imperial Alliance had at 
last assumed tangible form and shape. Germany, 
Kussia, and Austria stood shoulder to shoulder, con- 
fronting the remainder of Europe, arrogant and 
defiant in the belief that their combined force was 
sufficient to accomplish whatever usurpation of 
power or distribution of territory might be agreed 
upon between them. Opposed to them were Eng- 
land, with her scattered forces and comparatively 
unprotected sea- coast and colonies ; France, with a 
million and a half of men under arms and eager for 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AN^D CONSEQUENCES. 49 

revenge ; Spain, who had seized the opportunity to 
revive the Caroline Islands incident, and had joined 
fortunes with France ; Italy, bitterly incensed 
against Austrian aggression, and Turkey, armed for 
the death struggle with her traditionary enerny 
across the Danube. The Swiss Republic had at 
once proclaimed its neutrality, and strongly garri- 
soned its frontier at every point. Belgium also en- 
deavored at first to hold aloof from the struggle, 
but was drawn into it later by unavoidable com- 
plications. Holland and Denmark succeeded in 
keeping entirely out of the fight, though, as results 
ultimately proved, with no permanent advantage 
to themselves. 

Thus, then, at the opening of May, 1890, the 
armies of Europe stood arrayed for combat. A line 
of bristling bayonets, extending across Europe from 
the North Sea, along the Rhine to the Austrian 
Tyrol, and thence down to the Adriatic, marked the 
outposts of the Tri-Imperial forces, confronted by 
the armies of France and Italy. The Balkan 
peninsula was occupied by Russian and Austrian 
troops, ready at a moment's notice to make a dash 
upon Constantino]3le ; a Russian army had already 
invaded Northern India. The Mediterranean and 
North Sea swarmed with war vessels, and squadrons 
of the opposing powers had been dispatched to the 
Pacific and Indian Oceans to attack the commerce 
or colonies of their enemies, as occasion might offer. 
England, at the first show of hostilities, had seized 
the Suez Canal, and, with the aid of France and 
Italy, was holding it, without danger of being dis- 



50 ^'BIETIGHEIM. " 

turbed in its possession. The necessity, however, 
of concerted action was apparent, if an effective re- 
sistance was to be offered to the three empires. 
Accordingly, on the 10th of May, a Council of 
Plenipotentiaries, representing Great Britain, Spain, 
Italy, and Turkey, assembled at Paris to conclude 
with France an alliance, offensive and defensive, 
against Germany, Austria, and Russia. 

An invitation was extended to the United States 
of America by the council to become a party to the 
alliance. The proposal was a tempting one under 
the circumstances, however much its acceptance 
might be at variance with our oft-reiterated policy 
of non-interference in European politics. Never- 
theless, it was tempting. Times had changed, it 
was argued, since the Monroe doctrine had been 
proclaimed. 

Then we were a young republic, struggling for 
recognition among the people of the earth ; now 
w^e were foremost among the nations, and seeking 
just reparation from Germany for a wanton outrage ; 
should this musty tradition of the olden time be now 
allowed to stand in the way of a vindication of our 
national honor ? Moreover, Congress, in deciding 
upon the question of the proposed alliance, was 
greatly influenced by earnest appeals from France 
to come over and help her in her time of need as 
she had done for us in the Revolution. Should we 
accept, it was urged the weight of the American 
arms thrown into France's side of the scale would 
ensure a certainty of triumph over Germany, their 
common foe. The proposition proved popular. 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND COIvrSEQUENCES. 51 

Here were so many thousands of young men lying 
idle in the camps and clamoring to be led againsb 
their foreign enemy. There was something so 
novel, so alluring in the idea of an American army 
landing on the European continent and carrying the 
Stars and Stripes to victory on the very soil of their 
wanton aggressors, that the voice of the country 
was all but unanimous for the proposed alliance? 
and Congress accordingly, on the 25th of May, 
voted to make common cause with the allied powers, 
and authorized a further call for two hundred thou- 
sand men. The decision caused unbounded enthu- 
siasm both at home and abroad. London, Paris, 
Madrid, Rome, and Constantinople were illuminated 
in honor of the event, congratulatory cablegrams 
were received at the State Department from the 
various allied Governments, and at the English and 
French capitals, notwithstanding the gloom which 
otherwise prevailed, there were great popular rejoic- 
ings over this powerful accession to their joint cause. 

At this point, my friends, I close my narration 
of the events which preceded and led up to the war 
of 1890, We have seen how the long-smouldering 
fires of European jealousies and ambition have been 
finally fanned into a flame, and how, at the behest 
of their rulers, the immense standing armies which 
for years had been eating out their countries' very 
substance in times of peace, have at last sprung to 
arms, and stand confronting each other ready for 
the deadly fray ; we have seen our own land, after 
repeated measures of conciliation and forbearance. 



52 ** BIETIGHEIM." 

also at last drawn into this maelstrom of conflict, 
and ready to bear its share of disaster or conquer its 
share of victory in the defence of its most dearly 
cherished doctrine of protection to every citizen, 
however humble. In my next lecture I shall nar- 
rate the varying fortunes which followed our flag 
in the dire struggle that ensued, terminating in the 
glorious victory with which Providence crowned our 
arms. And now, in conclusion, a few words in re- 
gard to the remarkable manner in which the records 
of that memorable period have been and are being 
preserved. 

It is a trite remark, yet one which none of us will 
care to gainsay, that no historian can truthfully and 
impartially chronicle the events of his own day and 
generation ; yet, on the other hand, it is equally 
true that the historian who would faithfully and 
without bias record the events of an era that is past 
must depend to a very great extent upon the fidelity 
with which those who lived in that era have collated 
and preserved the great mass of details, true or 
false, prejudiced or unprejudiced, to which all 
periods of popular excitement give birth, and from 
which, only in the crucible of careful afterthought, 
can be distilled that pure truth which is to abide 
forever. To illustrate this fact, we have but to 
note in the historical annals of our own country the 
striking contrast between the comparatively meagre 
records which exist of the War of the Revolution 
and of the times of Washington as compared with 
the wonderfully complete and detailed histories of 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 53 

the War of Secession which are to be found in every 
library in the land. During the former j^eriod jour- 
nalism was in its infancy, our people were strug- 
gling for an existence, physical as well as national, 
and but little thought aj)pears to have been given to 
gathering and preserving reliable data upon which 
the historian of the future — a Bancroft, a Lossing, 
or a Headley — might depend. But during the Se- 
cession struggle thousands of printing-presses were 
in operation throughout the land, army correspond- 
ents and reporters were active everywhere, sol- 
diers' letters from the front were reprinted in their 
village papers, the widest publicity was given even 
to the smallest detail of news, files of the leading 
dailies w^ere carefully bound and put away upon li- 
brary shelves, scrap-books were regularly kept by 
thousands of patient readers, and one of these latter 
was, I find, even put in print under the title of 
'' The Rebellion Becord," and forms of itself a very 
comjDlete compendium of the spirit and deeds of that 
eventful period. The works of Greeley and S win- 
ton, intended by their authors to serve as histories 
of the war, though falling far short of that intention 
for the reason that they were written while the pas- 
sions engendered by the strife were yet hot, must 
nevertheless have proved invaluable as works of 
reference to later authors. Indeed, Mr. Matson 
acknowledges this fact in his masterly book, " The 
War Between the l^orthern and Southern States," 
now generally conceded to be the standard work on 
this subject. But more valuable still, not to him 
only, but to all others who in this twentieth century 



54 ^^BIETIGHEIM.*' 

have undertaken to clironicle that desperate and 
bloody fratricidal struggle, must have proven the 
admirably systematic measures taken by certain en- 
terprising publishers of periodicals and newspapers, 
some twenty years after the war had closed, to 
secure from surviving prominent participants, civil 
and military, articles descriptive of their personal 
reminiscences of the events in which they had taken 
part. I find, for instance, in our City Library, a 
bound volume of the Century Magazine for 1885 
in which several of the leading engagements of that 
war — Shiloh, Manassas, and Malvern Hill — are de- 
scribed by both of the opposing commanders, the 
descriptions being accompanied by maps, diagrams, 
and illustrations of the most complete character, I 
find, again, in the files of that staunch nationalist 
journal, the New York Tribune, for the same year, 
a series of articles on '^ Abraham Lincoln" fur- 
nished by a number of personal friends who had 
been in daily intercourse with him twenty years be- 
fore. I mention these facts as showing the activity 
of that period in ensuring the preservation and 
transmission of absolutely reliable records. The 
same remark applies to the systematic thoroughness 
with which the records of the great struggle of 1890- 
91 have been preserved and are being transmitted 
to our descendants. As yet the permanent history 
of that momentous period, the history of which is 
to take its place beside the works of Gibbon, 
Macaulay, Bancroft, MacMaster, and Matson, has 
not been given to the world. But to the mass of 
records of that period, both printed and written, 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 55 

which await the advent of the masterhand that shall 
blend them together into a book befitting the mag- 
nitude of the subject, I am indebted for the facility 
with which I have been enabled to bring together, 
in the space of these lectm'cs, a general outline of 
the great subject in hand. 



II. 

ITS COST. 

Never was spectacle more grand and inspiring 
tlian tliat which, on a bright morning in June, 1890, 
greeted the beholder who, from the ramparts of 
Fortress Monroe, looked out upon the wide waters 
of Hampton Roads. Line after line of stately craft 
lay marshalled at anchor upon the dancing tide, 
forming a marine pageant which in extent and 
grandeur surpassed any that the world had ever be- 
fore witnessed. Upward of a hundred large ocean 
steamers, with steam up and colors flying, and decks 
and rigging black with cheering soldiers, were 
awaiting the signal to weigh anchor and turn their 
prows eastward, past the distant capes, out into the 
broad Atlantic. Beyond them rode proudly at 
anchor a majestic fleet of twenty iron-clad frigates, 
some bearing the Stars and Stripes, others the tri- 
color of France. A score of dispatch boats, dart- 
ing hither and thither, in and out among the fleet 
of transports and war- vessels, were carrying the 
final messages and orders preparatory to departure. 
A host of smaller steam and sailing vessels, laden to 
the water's edge with enthusiastic multitudes who 
had come from all parts of the country to bid a 
God-speed to the departing troops, plied their way 



*' BIETIGHEIM." 57 

over the rippling waters, or paused under tlie shad- 
ows of the ocean monsters while the last words of 
adieu were spoken. From every side strains of 
martial music came wafted over the w^aters, min- 
gling with the screeching of steam-whistles and the 
exultant cheers of thousands upon thousands of 
voices. Suddenly from a bastion of the fortress a 
single gun boomed forth its echoes, and then an- 
other and another. It was the signal for departure ; 
and lo ! before the white puffs of smoke had van- 
ished away on the light breeze of that summer morn, 
the scene had been transformed to one of new activ- 
ity and life. The vast fleet of transports slowly 
rounded into lines of four abreast ; the war vessels 
steamed into stately ranks on either side, as their 
convoy ; and then, amid the roar of cannon, the 
whole fleet moved majestically seaward, carrying 
with it the hearts and hopes of our nation. Alas ! 
how many a brave heart throbbing with exultant 
pride that morning under the blue coat of the Amer- 
ican citizen-soldier was soon to be forever stilled in 
the sleep of death on some distant battle-fleld ! How 
many long days of danger and nights of waking, 
what hardships, exposures, and deadly conflicts were 
in store for those whom Heaven should spare to 
return as survivors crowned with victory to their 
beloved land ! These troops composed the first and 
second army corps of the American contingent sent 
to co-operate with the alHed forces in Europe, and 
were drawn mostly from the Central and Southern 
Military Departments. Pennsylvania was repre- 
sented by eight regiments of infantry and two bat- 



58 *' BIETIGHEIM.'' 

teries. There were tliree fine regiments of South. 
Carolinians and two others of stalwart Kentuckians, 
with not a man in the ranks under six feet in stat- 
ure. Ohio sent a '' Buckeye Brigade" of five 
regiments of infantry and one of heavy artillery ; 
Virginia, a brigade of five thousand men, entitled 
the Washington Guard, and Georgia an equal num- 
ber of infantry, with two batteries. Illinois, Indi- 
ana, Michigan, lov/a, Wisconsin, Missouri, and 
Kansas were each represented by two regiments, 
and North Carolina and Tennessee by one each. 
The entire contingent, fifty thousand strong, was 
under command of General Terry, an old army of- 
ficer. • Generals Fairchild, of Wisconsin, and Fitz- 
hugh Lee, of Yirginia, were the corps commanders. 
The former was already favorably known to the 
country by having served as Major- General of 
Division at Gettysburg, where he had lost an arm, 
nearly thirty years before, and by subsequent ser- 
vice as Governor of his State^nd United States 
^ft^^^CMinister to Spain. The latter, agisftof the great 
Confederate leader, and himself a Confederate 
veteran of renown, resigned the governorship of 
Yirginia to assume this command. Every one of 
the division and brigade commanders had, without 
a single exception, seen active service on one side 
or the other in the War of Secession, and many of 
the regimental field officers were also^ veterans of 
that struggle. Among the line ofiicers and men all 
classes of society were represented. Clerks, stu- 
dents, laborers, farmers, mechanics, had all sprung 
forward with alacrity in response to their country's 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 59 

call. There was a regiment from the Pennsjh^ania 
mining regions composed entirely of Irishmen ; an- 
other entirely of Germans from Wisconsin. Each 
command, in addition to the National colors, was al- 
lowed to carry the flag of its respective State. All 
the troops were armed with Springfield rifles and 
wore the United States regulation uniform, which 
at that time was practically the same as it is to-da}^ 
Among those who witnessed their embarkation and 
departure were the President and his Cabinet, who 
had come from Washington in a revenue cutter for 
that purpose. Only those whose experience carries 
them back to that time can realize by what herculean 
efforts and at wdiat enormous cost this large army 
had been organized, uniformed, armed, equipped, 
fed, and provided with railroad and ocean transpor- 
tation within such an incredibly short period of 
time. Yet with such admirable precision and har- 
mony had the work been carried out by the War 
and Navy Departments that the transports, which 
had been summoned by telegraph from every avail- 
able point, began to arrive in Hampton lioads simul- 
taneously with the arrival of the troops by rail at 
Norfolk and Fortress Munroe, and within one week 
thereafter the embarkation was complete. The 
command of the naval squadron of fourteen vessels 
and of the entire fleet of transports had been en- 
trusted to Admiral Cooper, to whom also Admiral 
L'Espes reported with a squadron of six iron-clads 
which the French Government had dispatched to 
assist in the convoy of the American troops. It 
was hence generally surmised, and, as results proved, 



60 ^^BIETIGHEIM." 

correctly, although, the fleet sailed under sealed 
orders, that its destination was some point on the 
French coast. That the undertaking of transporting 
so large a force of troops over three thousand miles 
of ocean was not unattended with great danger, 
'even in the presence of so formidable a convoy, was 
a fact generally admitted, for German and Russian 
fleets were already patrolling the seas from Land's 
End to Cape Finisterre, and the cable almost daily 
brought news of some naval engagement off the 
European coast. Yet it was believed that our navy, 
with the co-operation of the allied fleet, was fully 
equal to the task of landing safely on European soil 
not only these fifty thousand men, but the second 
fifty thousand who were already assembling at For- 
tress Monroe awaiting transportation and convoys 
to the same destination. 

Among those whose departure from Fortress 
Monroe has just been described, there was a young 
lieutenant of Kansas infantry — a mere boy in years 
— who, through all the perils and hardships to which 
so many of his comrades succumbed, was, by the 
infinite mercy of Providence, spared to return in 
health and strength to his native land, and, after the 
lapse of many years, to stand before you this even- 
ing and recount the changes and chances of that 
memorable campaign. (Loud applause.) From 
the first day of his enlistment up to the day when 
he was mustered out of service he made it a prac- 
tice to jot down in writing his impressions and ex- 
periences as they seemed to him worthy of record, 
and from these notes, which he has carefully pre- 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 61 

served, he proposes to read you occasional extracts 
m the course of this lecture. For instance : 

" Steamer Sldonia, June idih. {Eighth dmj out.)— Only four men 
on the sick list in Company B this morning. Weather splen- 
did. Captain thinks if all goes well we shall sight the French 
coast to-morrow night or early next morning. Exchanged 
signals at close quarters an hour ago with the Baltic, with 
South Carolina troops on board. The fleet keeps well together, 
and the sea before, behind, and on both sides of us is dotted 
with our transports under sail and steam. The war ships keep 
mostly in the advance, with a squadron of four or five bringing 
up the rear of the convoy and looking after the stragglers. 
Signals have been going to and fro actively, and the vessels 
appear to be keeping more closely together. Cole and I 
counted sixty-seven in sight at one time this morning, and as I 
write the number cannot certainly be less. In all probability, 
as we near the European coast the critical period of our voy- 
age approaches. It is generally believed among those who give 
the matter a thought, that a vigorous attempt will be made by 
the enemy's fleet to prevent our landing. 

'^Jiine 30th. — The constant exchange of signals to-day indi- 
cates that some important movement is in progress. All the 
transports— by actual count one hundred and nine — are in sight, 
the entire fleet being within an area of, I should judge, not 
over five square miles. The war vessels keep close by and 
move in three squadrons, one in advance and one on each 
flank. We are evidently nearing the waters where an attack 
from a hostile fleet is most to be apprehended. 

" Later. — Half an hour ago — it is now noon— a signal came 
from the flag-ship to ' Lay to.' The entire fleet of transports at 
once shortened sail and shut off steam, and we are now moving 
forward at only a snail's pace through a moderately smooth 
sea. The reason for the order soon became known throughout 
our ship and caused intense excitement. A squadron of eight 
war vessels has been sighted to the north-eastward. Our ad- 
vance squadron and four iron-clads from those guarding our 
north flank have gone forward to ascertain who the strangers 
are. It is barely possible they are Englishmen and friends. 



62 '' BIETIGHEIM." 

" Later. — Another squadron of four or five war ships has just 
hove in sight to the southward, and rumor says they are flying 
the Austrian colors. A second detachment of our convoy, com- 
posed of three vessels, has been dispatched to meet them, 
leaving us only two frigates, the Chicago and Manhattan, as a 
guard. The transports have come to a dead stop, and we are 
tossing idly about on the waters, awaiting events. 

^'July 1st. — God be praised ! the victory is ours, but at what a 
fearful cost ! I scarcely know where to begin with a narration 
of all the thrilling events which have been crowded into the 
past twenty-four hours. It all looks to me now like a dreadful 
dream from which we have awakened to find ourselves push- 
ing on, under full pressure of steam and sail, toward the French 
coast, already in sight. 

" I had gone below about 2 p.m. yesterday to try to find a spare 

corner to sit down and write to D , when Captain Collins 

came rushing down breathlessly, exclaiming : ' Come, Minor 
— where are you ? — the ball has opened.' I hastened on deck, 
and saw far away to the north-east a great cloud »of white 
smoke rising above the sea, through which, here and there, 
were dimly discernible the masts and spars of the combatants. 
*' Look there, too," said Collins, pointing in the opposite direc- 
tion. I turned and saw that our fleet to the southward was 
also already engaged. Great Heaven ! and here we were, fifty 
thousand good men and true, full of patriotic ardor and fight, 
compelled to stand idly by and see our fate decided by a score 
of war ships ! The suppressed anxiety and excitement among 
the men was something terrible. The thought of being sent 
to the bottom by a stray shot from one of the enemy's guns 
was not more terrible than that of defeat, and of being thus 
ignominiously captured by ship-loads without firing a gun. 
As we stood with compressed lips and beating hearts listening 
to the reverberating echoes that came booming over the waters 
from northward and southward of us, the Chicago signalled 
* About ship, ' and an hour later the transport fleet, headed 
by the two war ships, had steamed far away to seaward again, 
in a north-westerly direction, and to a point out of the possible 
range of the guns of either of the contending fleets. There we 
lay-to once more, and again the terrible suspense began. The 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CON"SEQUENCES. 63 

incessant roar of cannon still reached us from far away over 
the waters, but the combatants were no longer visible to others 
than the signal-men aloft. 

*' But this quiet did not last long ; it was the dead calm pre- 
ceding the storm. The cannonading from the southward 
seemed to grow nearer and nearer, and turning our eyes 
eagerl}' in that direction, we perceived that three vessels had 
detached themselves from the main body of the combatants, 
and were steering directly toward us. Orders were at once 
given to beat all the men to quarters. ' Steam north-west, 
and keep together,' signalled the Chicago, and off we went 
again seaward, our two escorts following slowly in our wake. 
But the approaching ships gained on us steadily. * Two 
Austrians and a Frenchman bearing straight down on us,' 
reported the signal-men in the round-top. The Austrians 
were in the lead, evidently bent on reaching us first, and pay- 
ing no attention to the French ship which followed them, 
closely firing as she came. Now was the moment for action. 
The enemy must have been within five miles of us when we 
saw the Manhattan suddenly put about and make straight for 
them, we still steaming away seaward at full speed to keep out 
of harm's way. In a few minutes the Austrians rounded to 
and opened upon her with a full broadside from each, but so 
far as we could see without checking her course. It was evi- 
dently her plan to endeavor to engage them both, until the 
Frenchman could come up and make the struggle more nearly 
an equal one. But in vain. One of the enemy kept on, head- 
ing straight for us, and when within two miles of us sent a 
shell which carried away the foremast of one of the transports, 
and the smoke-stack of another. Now came the Chicago's turn. 
Sending her first officer in an open boat to the Alaska to take 
command as flag officer of the transport fleet, the noble ship, 
as if endowed with life and conscious of the work before her, 
put quickly about, and amid the cheers of the soldiers hastened 
to meet her foe. In spite of the rapidly widening distance 
between us, we could watch the splendid manoeuvring of both 
vessels as they approached each other. The enemy's ship had 
now ceased sending shells after us, and turned its attention to 
the Chicago. In the midst of the cannonading, there suddenly 
came a dull rumbling roar, and not long after, the other 



64 '^BIETIGHEIM." 

Austrian again hove in sight, with the Frenchman engaging 
her as before, yet both heading direct for us, regardless of the 
Chicago and her antagonist. 'Crowd on all steam,' signalled 
the Alaska ; yet some of the slower transports, ours included, 
had already commenced falling behind, and were in imminent 
danger of being overtaken and captured. Seeing the danger, 
and determined to protect the transports and troops at every 
cost, the Chicago, by a sudden feint, turned, and leaving her 
opponent, pushed to head ofE the second Austrian, now rapidly 
nearing the hindmost stragglers. Then began a desperate 
struggle, the two vessels grappling each other at short range 
and delivering deadly broadsides, with the muzzles of their 
guns almost in each other's ports. Such a prodigious rain of 
iron and steel nothing could long withstand. The Austrian 
struck her colors, and ten minutes later the Stars and Stripes 
were flying from her fore, and the Chicago and Frenchman 
were making for her consort, which had already intercepted 
and cut off two or three of the hindmost troop-ships. Stray 
shot from the fight were falling thick around us, yet in the 
midst of it all the enthusiastic cheering of the troops as they 
saw our flag run up on the conquered iron- clad could be heard 
at every interval in the terrific cannonade. And now the 
Frenchman had grappled with the remaining Austrian frigate, 
and it was a war to the death. The Chicago, though badly dis- 
abled, joined in the attack ; but Providence willed that it 
should be of short duration, for we saw the ill-fated Austrian 
slowly careen and then disappear beneath the waves, yet de- 
livering a deadly broadside at the last moment, even when her 
ports v/ere level with the water' s edge. 

" A hush like that of death ensued for a few moments, and 
then, when the truth flashed upon us that we were saved, for 
the time at least, there burst forth from thousands of throats a 
prolonged outburst of cheering such as can only come from 
men who have through long hours of peril and anxiety stood 
helplessly by to watch and pray for victory. The scenes which 
I saw around me beggared all description. Men who but a 
half hour before had stood mutely brave in the presence of 
almost certain death or captivity were now weeping like chil- 
dren, frantically embracing each other, or falling on their 
knees in fervent thanks to God. But when the first flush of 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 65 

triumph had passed, we awoke to realize the horrible signifi- 
cance of the scenes through which we had just passed. The 
Manhattan had exploded her magazine and gone to the bottom 
with all on board ; the commanding officer of the Chicago and 
over a hundred of her officers and crew had been killed out- 
right, and of the survivors barely enough were left uninjured 
to man the ship ; the Frenchman had suffered the least, though 
her losses were considerable ; on the captured Austrian two 
thirds of the crew were found dead or wounded, and the sur- 
render had been made by an ensign, who proved to be the 
ranking surviving officer. The troop -ships had also suffered 
severel}^ principally the slower ones, which had been struck by 
random shots. Our vessel providentiallj'- escaped any injury, 
but the Damascus was found to be in a sinking condition, and 
her troops, consisting of a Virginia battery and a battalion 
from Baltimore, were transferred without serious loss of life to 
other vessels. Signals were immediately sent out from the 
Alaska for the foremost transports to slow up and allow the 
others to rejoin them. The engagement had not lasted over 
three hours at most, and by six o'clock the bulk of the fleet was 
close together again, with the Chicago, the Frenchman, and the 
Austrian prize near at hand. Meanwhile the roar of cannon 
had continued without intermission in the quarter to the 
north-east, where the main engagement had been in progress 
since early in the afternoon. A dispatch boat brought the 
intelligence that a fleet composed of eight German and seven 
Russian iron-clads had made a desperate but futile attack on 
Admiral Cooper, with the intention of breaking through his 
lines and reaching the transports. The firing to the south- 
ward had also broken out again furiously, and erelong it 
seemed for awhile that a greater danger than before threatened 
us, for a fleet of not less than ten or a dozen war ships ap- 
peared on the horizon, moving rapidly northward, firing as 
they came. Again we got the signal to steam seaward, while 
the gallant Chicago and her two consorts once more prepared 
for action. But suddenly the signal was countermanded — 
what could it mean ? The reason was soon apparent. We saw 
the remaining three frigates of the Austrian fleet making under 
full steam for the scene of the greater combat, pursued by and 
keeping up a running fire with two of our own and one French 



66 " BIETIGHEIM. 



j> 



iron-clad ; and to our surprise two splendid double-turret 
armored ships, which certainly were new arrivals on the scene. 
*' They are Spaniards," shouted the signal-men from aloft, and 
another deafening cheer went up from our decks, and was re- 
peated from ship to ship in the fleet. It "was their opportune 
arrival that had turned the tide of battle and completed the 
rout of the Austrian squadron. Eagerly now we awaited the 
issue of the combat still raging to the north-eastward, where, 
for nearly five long hours, fifteen of our American and French 
ships had been valiantly defending us against an equal number 
of the enemy. The scale of battle would, we were certain, turn 
decisively in our favor so soon as the re-enforcements in the 
shape of the two Spaniards and the three of our own fleet who 
were running down the Austrians should reach the scene of 
the fight. But we were not permitted to stand by and see the 
result. Our distance fronl the French coast— we were ofl St. 
Nazaire — was estimated at not over a hundred to a hundred 
and fifty miles, and it was wisely decided by Admiral Cooper, 
while he was engaging the war ships, to let the transports 
make a desperate run for it to the south-eastward, and try to 
make the port of Eochelle. Instructions to this effect reached 
us about 8 P.M., and then off we went at full speed, soon leaving 
the incessant roar of cannon far astern. At ten this morning 
we sighted the French coast (Sables d'Olonne), and now (at 
3 P.M.) there is every prospect that before dusk all the trans- 
ports will be safely riding at anchor, and safe in port. 

" July Uh. — A significant fact it is that this anniversary of 
American Independence from European tyranny witnesses the 
first landing of American soldiers on European soil. The 
debarkation of the troops began early this morning, and our 
regiment has already gone into camp in the outskirts of the 
city (Kochelle). In order to expedite the landing of the entire 
force, a portion of the steamers have gone up the Gharente to 
Eochefort and other points, and it is expected that by to- 
morrow noon the whole army will be safe on terra Jznna once 
more, and that, too, within a fortnight after its departure from 
Fort Monroe. Shades of Columbus ! think of it. The con- 
dition and spirit of the soldiers are excellent. In Company 
B we have with us, answering to roll-call, every man but two 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 67 

of those who left Kansas City, and of the missing ones, one is 
in hospital from a fall, and the other was lost overboard at sea. 
General Fairchild rode past our camp this morning and was 
enthusiastically cheered, 

*' LcUer. — We have news from the great naval engagement at 
last through the French papers, which call it the ' Battle of 
St. Nazaire ;' and the destruction and loss of life on both sides 
prove to have been appalling. As we supposed, the arrival of 
the re-enforcements decided the day, and put to flight such of 
the enemy's ships as were able to save themselves. But we 
lost three ships besides the Manhattan, and the French two, 
and it is estimated that, on our side alone, fully two thousand 
men were put hors de combat We captured four of their iron- 
clads and sank two more, the rest managing to escape under 
cover of night. The papers speak of the engagement as sur- 
passing in extent, desperation, and destructiveness any naval 
battle that has ever before been fought, either in ancient or 
modern times." 

At this point, my hearers, we will leave the young 
lieutenant and his diary for awhile and return to a 
more general view of the great events in which he 
was participating. Yon all know of the battle of 
St. Nazaire, and how it shattered, in the very be- 
ginning of the straggle, the prestige of the Imperial 
navies. It has always been England's regret that 
it was not her good fortune to assist in that brilliant 
victory ; but she succeeded in doing what was per- 
haps of equal importance, for two days later a pow- 
erful British squadron encountered the fugitive 
remnants of the Imperial fleet in the Channel off 
Plymouth, and so severely handled them that for 
six months thereafter not a hostile ship was en- 
countered by the Allied fleets in those waters. But 
the enemy's navy, though crippled, was not dead ; 
it had only turned its hostile attentions elsewhere. 



68 ^*BIETIGHEIM." 

England's firm grasp upon the Suez Canal proved 
a source of great difficulties to the Imperial plans, 
and early in the campaign a desperate effort to gain 
possession of it at any cost had been resolved upon 
by Kussia. It was also imperatively necessary to 
Russia that she should have free access to and from 
the Black Sea, and almost her first decisive act was 
to move upon Constantinople, with a view to com- 
manding the Dardanelles. Turkey had no adequate 
force to oppose against the overwhelming army of 
Russians, Roumanians, Bulgarians, and Servians that 
swooped down upon her. Her troops made a des- 
perate but vain endeavor to stay the advancing 
hosts, and almost the first news that greeted the 
American soldiers on landing in France was that 
Constantinople had fallen, and that Turkey was for- 
ever blotted out from the map of Europe. Not so 
the Turkish army, however. Composed of five hun- 
dred thousand trained soldiers, it withdrew to the 
Asiatic territory only to reappear later and confront 
its foes at another and more distant point. Its pow- 
erful iron- clad navy, too, after a gallant struggle in 
the Golden Horn, before the surrender, escaped 
safely into the Mediterranean, and subsequently 
proved an effective re-enforcement to the Allied fleet 
in those waters. 

At this point, in order to afford some idea of the 
magnitude of the struggle which was in progress, 
let us glance for a moment at the number of soldiers 
placed in the field, and of iron-clad ships put in 
commission by the respective contestants. I find 




m 

M 
I 

P5 
►4 
H 
H 

M 

w 

i-i 
H 

M 

PQ 

M 
H 






6^ 



E 
a 

ai 

P 
b 

li 

tl 

tc 
ir 
f( 

P 

h 

C 
e 

t] 
d 

J: 
a 

e 

t 

s 

I 
i 



.,V>:, ■%?/: 






ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 



69 



in the London Times of August 25tli, 1890, tlie fol- 
lowing estimate of the opposing forces as thej were 
at that time distributed : 



ALLIED FORCES. 
TltOOPS. 





0) 




'd 








Nation. 


c3 QJ 

CD S 

^3 


2 1=^ 


§ 2 r 
9 "■' o 


* 

"Si 

< 


^rn Indi 
ier and 
anistan. 


Total. 




o 


i-, 

o 




a 






France . . 


900,000 




300,000 




1,200,000 


Gt. Brit.. 


100,000 


— 


f 600, 000 


— 


250,000 


950,000 


Italy 


— 


350,000 


100,000 


— 


— 


450,000 


Spain . . 


100,000 


— 


300,000 


— 


— 


400,000 


Turkey. . 


— 


— 


— 


500,000 


— 


500,000 


U. States 


100,000 


— 


— 


— 


— 


100,000 


Total... 


1,200,000 


350,000 


1,300,000 


500,000 


250,000 


3,600,000 



lEON-CLADS. 











Id 








xi 


• 


. 


a 














03 






Nation. 


o 

^ . 

r-l ^ 

=J m 


Pi 

O 


(3 


leg 


o 
m 


Total. 




^ 


^ 


W 








France . . 


19 


24 


5 


14 


3 


65 


Gt. Brit. . 


15 


18 


4 


16 


4 


57 


Italy 


— 


3 


1 


20 


1 


25 


Spain 


— 


7 


1 


8 


2 


18 


Turkey. . 


— 


4 


— 


14 


— 


18 


XJ. States 


2 


21 


3 


— 


5 


31 


Total... 


36 


77 


14 


72 


15 


214 



* After the fall of Constantinople. 

+ Including the forces scattered in the colonies. 



BIETIGHEIM. 



TRI-IMPERIAL FOECES. 

TKOOPS. 





CD 


^1 ^ 

<D O 

o H 


^ 03 










U OJ 


a rZi 


'^ ? 


C 5° tj 


<| fl <u 




Nation. 


o 


Northern 
of Italy an 


pq S 


Garriso 

Fortresse 
Seapo 


In Central 
on Norther 
fronti 


Total. 


Germany 


1,000,000 


_ 




300,000 


._ 


1,300,000 


Eussia.. . 


— 


— 


*750,000 


150,000 


300,000 


1,200,000 


Austria . . 


250,000 


400,000 
400,000 


100,000 


150,000 


— 


900,000 


Total... 


1,250,000 


850,000 


600,000 


300,000 


3,400,000 



IRON-CLADS. 





rC 






'O 








"£ 


o 


o 


03 . 






















^ 


S 


g 


|i 


S 




Nation. 




O 


o 

02 




,23 

to 


Total. 


Germany 


14 


10 


2 


5 


6 


37 


Eussia. . . 


12 


12 


4 


8 


4 


40 


Austria . . 


3 


6 


2 


10 


2 


23 


Total... 


29 


28 


8 


23 


12 


100 



It will be perceived that, so far as the land forces 
M^ere concerned, there was no great disparity be- 
tween the contestants. But the superiority of the 
Allied forces on the seas was apparent and boded no 
good to the ultimate success of the Imperial cause, 



* Including Roumanians and Bulgarians. 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 71 

even slionld their armies prove temporarily victori- 
ous. The fall of the Turkish capital had merely 
served to draw the lines of battle closer, and had 
squarely divided the fight between Eastern and 
Western Europe. 

So matters stood then toward the close of that 
eventful summer. Early in August the second con- 
tingent of American troops had landed at Nantes 
and Cherbourg, having been convoyed over by a 
fleet of Allied iron-clads so formidable that the 
enemy had not dared to renew the attack. 

The problem of provisioning the immense forces 
in the field, especially the two and a half million 
soldiers confronting each other in Central Europe 
along or near the Khine, was the most difiicult one 
which the leaders had to solve. The Imperial armies 
had the advantage of the vast storehoases of Ger- 
many and the great granaries of Hungary and 
Southern Russia at their disposal, and with them 
the principal difiiculty consisted in transporting the 
provisions with sufficient regularity and promptitude 
to the front. The Allies, on the other hand, found 
their resources heavily taxed at first to provide even 
a supply for their armies sufficient for two days' 
rations ahead, and for a time it was feared that 
the grim spectre of starvation, hovering over the 
Allied camps, would undo and ruin all. Forta- 
nately, the cables to India and America were avail- 
able in this emergency, and supplies of flour and 
beef adequate to any demand were soon on the way 
to Brindisi and Nantes. In September the trans- 



72 ^'BIETIGHEIM." 

port ships returned a third time to Europe loaded 
down with stores and munitions, and more strongly 
convoyed than before, no less than fifty iron-clads, 
detailed from the Korth Atlantic squadron, accom- 
panying them over. This time the enemy again 
attacked in force, in mid-ocean, and another despe- 
rate engagement ensued. Seven of the transports 
were sunk by torpedoes and two captured, but the 
enemy was finally beaten off after a determined 
fight lasting for two days, in which the Allies, how- 
ever, lost three of their best ships — the Colossus 
(English), Saragossa (Spanish), and Wissahickon 
(American), and the Imperialists two — the Preussen 
and Hansa (both German). It may here be men- 
tioned that the fleet of provision ships made two 
more trips similarly convoyed without being again 
attacked, and the military depots, which were estab- 
lished at Rochefort and Cherbourg, were by the 
beginning of December stocked with enough pro- 
visions to supply all the Allied troops in Europe for 
six months to come. 

It fared worse, however, with the provisions ^rom 
India. The first fleet of forty transports, laden 
mostly with grain from the Hoogly, were con- 
voyed up the Red Sea and passed safely through 
the Suez Canal to the Mediterranean, where they 
were met by a fleet of fifteen armor-clad frigates, 
under orders to convoy them to Brindisi. But the 
convoy was too weak. The British could spare but 
two ships from guarding the canal ; Spain, France, 
and Italy needed most of theirs for the protection 
of their Mediterranean coast and seaports, and con- 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 73 

sequently detailed but one frigate each ; tlie re- 
mainder were drawn from the Turkisli fleet, which, 
since its escape from Constantinople, had been 
cruising off the coast of Asia Minor, attacking the 
Anstrians or Russians where it could. And now 
the Imperial squadron in the Mediterranean saw its 
opportunity and improved it. Off Zantes eighteen 
of their ships, carrying in all thirty odd guns more 
than the Allied convoy, boldly attacked and worsted 
the latter, and sank or captured two thirds of the 
Yjrovision ships, only nine of the latter managing 
to escape and reach Brindisi in safety. All but 
one, however, of the Turkish and other Allied 
frigates escaped ; the engagement was renewed a 
week later off the Island of Candia, two Italian 
ships having in the mean time re-enforced the fleet, 
and this time the Allies gained a victory, though 
by no means a decisive one. From that time, in 
view of the vast supplies arriving and to arrive 
from America, the provisioning of the Allied 
European troops, via the Suez Canal, was practi- 
cally abandoned. 

Meanwhile the Imperialists, notwithstanding the 
numerical inferiority of their naval forces, were 
everywhere aggressive on the seas. Germany es- 
pecially was putting forth herculean efforts to attack 
the smaller seaports of her enemies. Oran in 
Algiers was laid in ashes ; Dieppe, in an unguarded 
moment, suffered a similar fate, and Cadiz had to 
undergo a forty-eight hours' bombardment, which 
was only terminated by the arrival of a superior 
force of Spanish and French cruisers, who put the 



74 ^^BlETIQHEIM." 

assailants to flight. Three Russian ships suddenly 
appeared in the Irish Channel one day in Septem- 
ber, and before they were disturbed managed to 
throw enough shells into Cork to burn down half 
the city. The activity displayed by the enemy was 
incredible. An Austrian and two German iron- 
clads which had been sent to the Pacific, where 
they had played havoc among our own and English 
merchant vessels, made a hostile demonstration 
against San Francisco, hoping to shell the city. 
But a well-aimed torpedo from Fort Alcatraz sent 
one of them to the bottom, and the others, fearing a 
similar fate, abandoned the attempt. Great anxiety 
was nevertheless felt in all the American seaports 
lest a hostile fleet should suddenly appear in over- 
whelming numbers, and no efforts were left untried 
to strengthen the fortifications, mount the heaviest 
guns, and hold in constant readiness the most ap- 
proved system of torpedo service. Of the three 
hundred thousand troops still under arms in the 
country, one third were detailed for garrison duty, 
and the remainder, as all fears of a foreign invasion 
had passed, were dismissed to their homes, subject 
to call in case of emergency. 

Such was the condition of affairs when, one day 
in December, telegraphic news came from Havana 
that an Imperial fleet of eighteen iron-clads had 
suddenly appeared off the Cuban coast and was 
threatening a demonstration against Moro Castle. 
Twelve hours later came the intelligence that the 
bombardment had begun and that Havana was in 
flames. At that point telegraphic communication 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCKS. 75 

was interrupted, and it was sarmised, as afterward 
proved to be the case, that the city had surrendered. 
Two days later a dispatch came from South-West 
Pass that a Jarge number of iron-chads were in the 
offing and rapidly approaching the entrance to the 
Mississippi. It proved to be the same Imperial fleet 
which had captured Havana. The excitement in 
New Orleans on the receipt of this intelligence was 
indescribable. Preparations for the defence of the 
city, it is true, had not been neglected. Forts 
Jackson and St. Philip had been mounted with very 
heavy ordnance ; half a dozen small iron-clad moni- 
tors for river service, each carrying one heavy gun, 
had been patriotically fitted out and manned by the 
people of the city themselves ; there was an abun- 
dant supply of torpedoes, and at three or four points 
heavy chains were in readiness to be stretched 
across the stream. Yet all this seemed to promise 
no adequate means of successful resistance to such 
an overwhelming force of assailants. Next came 
the news that the enemy's fleet, numbering fifteen 
vessels, had passed the jetties and engaged the forts 
and monitors ; the latter vessels were splendidly 
handled, and fought with daring and desperation ; 
but the enormous shells and solid shot from the 
enemy's turret ships crashed through their plates 
as if they were made of paper, and within two 
hours every one of the six was hors de coiiibat. 
The forts and chains merely served to retard the 
enemy's vessels, but could not long prevent their 
advance ; then New Orleans seemed doomed. 
Thousands of non-combatants, principally women 



76 " BIETIGHEIM. " 

and children, were quickly sent away "upon trains 
and river-boats ; the city was placed under military 
control ; all those who were not on duty were ordered 
to remain quietly in their domiciles ; and then for 
twelve long mortal hours the Crescent City awaited 
in suspense the arrival of tlie hostile vessels, at 
whose commander's mercy it thus unexpectedly 
found itself. 

But the battle was not yet won. At a point on 
the river some ten miles below the city there v/as a 
torpedo-station, which had been established a few 
years earlier by the Government for experimental 
practice, and where, since the opening of hostilities, 
extensive preparations had been made for the recep- 
tion of any hostile vessels which might succeed in 
getting so far up the stream. The post was in 
charge of a captain of ordnance, an experienced and 
advanced electrician, with a squad of a dozen men ; 
but even this small force proved quite sufficient for 
the important duty assigned to it. As the first ves- 
sel rounded a bend in the river about a mile away, 
an electric submarine torpedo, discharged with un- 
erring aim, fastened upon its bow. For an instant 
the giant craft quivered as if stricken by a cyclone, 
and in another moment careened and was carried off 
down the stream by the mighty current, crashing 
heavily into the next vessel behind it, which had 
sought too late by dexterous steering to avert the 
catastrophe. The third vessel sheered off, and pass- 
ing the other two, rounded the point. Another 
torpedo, aimed with fatal precision, struck her as 
she was crossing the current to mid-stream, and the 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CON'SEQUENCES. 77 

next instant the roar of a hundred thunders rent the 
air. The missile had exploded the powder maga- 
zine and blown ship, cannon, and crew into the air. 
Undeterred by this catastrophe, and as yet only sur- 
mising its cause, a fourth and a fifth vessel rounded 
the point abreast of each other ; one was struck, 
disabled, and, like the first, drifted back upon the 
vessels behind it ; the other kept on apparently un- 
injured. A second torpedo was fired at it ; that, 
too, for some unaccountable reason, missed its aim ; 
by this time it was nearly abreast of the station. 
The captain of ordnance aimed a third torpedo with 
his own hand. The result was almost instantaneous. 
The iron-clad staggered like a wounded lion, 
careened, swung helplessly round on the tide, and 
after drifting a short distance, disappeared beneath 
the current. 

All this had happened within half an hour after 
the first vessel had come within range ; yet in that 
short space of time a third of the enemy's fleet had 
been disposed of. The other vessels wisely stayed 
their course, seeing that to round the fatal point 
was certain disaster. Even the whereabouts of the 
spot from which these deadly missiles emanated was 
unknown to them. The captain and his squad of 
soldiers were concealed in a bomb-proof behind the 
levee embankment, and the submarine torpedoes 
were discharged through long tubes piercing the 
levee from the interior of the bomb-proof, and 
sighted directly upon certain points which an enemy 
must pass. Two years of constant calculation and 
experiments at this point had resulted in such pro- 



78 '^BIETIGHEIM.'' 

ficiencj that it was moderately certain that, with an 
expert electrician in command, no hostile ship could 
succeed in passing the six points successively covered 
by the torpedo tubes radiating from the interior of 
the bomb-proof. 

But to the enemv the location and nature of this 
unseen deadly foe could only be a matter of surmise. 
No building, no flag-staif, nothing whatever indi- 
cated the existence of the bomb-proof, excavated as 
it was in the inward slope of the levee. Suddenly 
came the announcement that the enemy's fleet, 
lying sheltered from the torpedoes behind the point, 
was putting a force of men ashore on both banks of 
the river, with the evident intention of finding and 
destroying the torpedo station. A battalion of 
marines, apparently about five hundred strong, was 
soon afterward to be seen advancing cautiously up 
the levee on the right bank. But this contingency 
had also been foreseen and provided against ; the 
marines were driven back with heavy loss by two 
regiments of Louisiana volunteers who had been 
brought down from the city to support the torpedo 
station as soon as it was known that the fleet had 
passed the forts. The landing party on the left 
bank marched unopposed up the levee a distance of 
four or five miles with the river on one side and an 
impassable morass on the other, and then returned 
by the way it came. New Orleans was saved. The 
enemy's fleet made no further endeavor to round 
the point which had proved so fatal. On the follow- 
ing day it steamed down the river, but only there 
to encounter fresh disaster. A daring party of 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 79 

wreckers and fishermen from the Cliaiideleur Islands 
had managed under cover of night to sink a scliooner 
laden with stones directly in the channel between 
the jetties, and the enemy's fleet was caught as in a 
trap. All efforts to raise the obstruction proved in- 
effectual, and after a week of vain endeavor to de- 
vise some means of escape, the officers, men, and 
stores were landed at the forts, and the ships w^ere 
abandoned and blown up to prevent their capture, 
which was an ultimate certainty. The surrender of 
the forts themselves proved only a question of time 
and provisions, and ten days later the entire force 
of the enemy, about four thousand officers and men, 
gave themselves up as prisoners of war, and the 
Stars and Stripes once more waved over the forts. 

{From the Denver Tribune, December 23d, 1890.) 

KEJOICINGS IN NEW ORLEANS. 

The City Bkllliantlt Illuminated. 

HoNOES TO Captain Button and his Men. 

The Victorious Volunteers FIted. 

{Special to ihe Tribune.) 

New Orleans, December 22d. — To-night the Crescent City is 
one blaze of joy and festivity. The prisoners from the forts 
were landed at the foot of Poydras Street this afternoon, the 
non-commissioned officers and men being taken to the Soniat 
and Freret cotton-presses, and the officers paroled. The Rus- 
sian Commander von Besikow, the ranking officer of the 
enemy's fleet, is at the Royal Hotel, where curious crowds 
have gathered to catch sight of him. The electric illumiDation 
covers the entire city from CarroUton to Chalmette, the levee 
being rendered especially noticeable by the electric lamps at 
regular intervals for the entire distance. Captain Dutton and 



80 '^ BIETIGHEIM." 

his men were placed in open carriages and drawn throngli the 
crowded streets at the head of the military and civic procession 
which escorted the Crescent and Pelican regiments to Lafayette 
Square on their return from St. Charles Parish, where the 
mayor congratulated them in the name of the city and State on 
their gallant repulse of the enemy's marines, and defence of 
the torpedo station. At the present hour (11 p.m.) the city is 
given over to music, mirth, and revelry, and the best of order 
and good feeling prevail. 

Tliis disaster proved fatal to the naval prestige of 
tlie Imperial Allies, and caused great and universal 
rejoicing throughout the Union. The captain — 
Button was his name — who, by his skill and cool- 
ness, had so largely contributed to the victory, was 
brevetted a colonel, and Congress ordered a com- 
memorative medal of gold struck off for him and 
similar ones of silver for his men and the Chandeleur 
Ushers, and pensioned them all for life. 

The land operations meanwhile on the European 
continent up to the close of 1890 had, while not prov- 
ing in any way decisive for either contestant, re- 
sulted in the main favorably to the Imperial forces. 
The fighting between the Austrians and Italians 
along the Tyrolese frontier had been continuous and 
bloody, now resulting in a victory for the one and 
now for the other, but with no practical advantage 
to either. The Swiss had strongly fortified and gar- 
risoned the approaches to the St. Gotthard, and had 
been unavoidably drawn into several sharp engage- 
ments in defence of their frontier lines, but other- 
wise maintained a strictly defensive policy. It was 
now toward the immense armies confronting each 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 81 

other in Central Europe that the eyes of the world 
were turned, for upon them depended, as was gen- 
erally believed, the final issue of the struggle. The 
Allied armies seemed the more disposed of the two 
to assume the aggressive, but it was not until Jan- 
nary (1891) that a general advance at all points was 
begun. Four great armies of three hundred thou- 
sand men each were simultaneously put in motion, 
with Cologne, Coblentz, Metz, and Strasbourg as ob- 
jective points. One half of the American contin- 
gent operated with the army moving upon Metz ; 
the other half, and that one with the movements of 
which we are especially concerned, had been incor- 
porated into the Army of the Yosges, which, under 
the command of General Boulanger, was massed 
along the Alsatian frontier, prepared to operate 
upon Strasbourg. The condition of the army was 
in the main good, though the long period of forced 
inaction, while it had been used to improve the dis- 
cipline and efficiency of the troops, had told some- 
what upon their morale^ especially among the 
American and Spanish forces, who had hoped long 
ere this to have been led against the enemy. The 
familiar cry, '' I want to go home," had begun here 
and there to be heard, though only in jest, through 
our camp ; and it was therefore with enthusiasm un- 
bounded that the news of an early forward move- 
inent was received. In order that the position of 
the Army of the Yosges and the enemy's troops op- 
posed to it may be made clear at a glance, I have 
had prepared the following rough sketch showing 
the adjacent frontier sections of France and Alsace 



S2 ^'BIETIGHEIM.'* 

(then German territorj) in whicli the two armies 
were located and to operate. The frontier line here 
shown passes for its entire distance— say from Bel- 
fort to Avriconrt — through the mountain region 
known as the Yosofes, or in German as the Yoffesen. 
'No railroad then crossed the frontier between the 
two points mentioned, but you will observe that 
numerous spur and branch railroads run down to 
points close to the frontier on the French side, fur- 
nishing means for throwing heavy bodies of troops 
upon nearly any given border point at short notice. 
From these railway termini — viz., Giromagny, St. 
Maurice, Cornimont, Gerardmer, Fraize, Badonvil- 
ler, and Cirey, good post roads, passing through 
charming valley scenery, led over the frontier into 
the Alsatian (German) territory. All of these passes 
were strongly fortified and garrisoned, and there 
had been constant skirmishing and occasional artil- 
lery duels going on at the outposts all along the line 
for two months prior to the general advance. In 
December the cold had been severe, considerable 
snow had fallen, and the men, though for the most 
part comfortably housed, had begun to feel seri- 
ously the rigor of the climate. This added to the 
satisfaction felt at the announcement of an intended 
general attack. 

The position occupied by the American troops 
extended along the frontier line from Fraize to 
Gerardmer, General Terry's and General Fairchild's 
headquarters being at the latter point, and General 
Fitzhuo'h Lee's at the former. The vanguard which 
was to lead the attack at this point was Potter's 



VIAP I. SHOWIN"G FIELD OF OPERATION AGAINST STRASBOURG. 







ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CON-SEQUENCES. 83 

division of four brigades of Ohio, Micliigan, Min- 
nesota, and Missouri troops, which was stationed at 
a httle hamlet called Le Collet, not over a mile from 
the frontier Une, supported bj Dewey's division in 
reserve. It was on the morning of January 4th that 
the general cannonade was opened. But just here 
let our young Kansas lieutenant turn once more to 
his note-book, and recall some of the memories of 
that and the succeeding days. 

" Gamp at Longemer, January 4dh, 1891. — At three o'clock this 
morning I was roused out of a sound sleep by Captain Camp- 
bell, who came to say that the division was ordered under arms 
at daybreak. Shortly after that orders came for the men to 
turn out and hold themselves in readiness to march, with three 
days' rations and full cartridge-boxes. At seven the brigade 
was paraded for inspection and then addressed by General 
Massey, who told the men that a general advance had been 
ordered, and that the long-looked-for opportunity to be led 
against the enemy would soon be offered them. He urged 
ever3'' man, officer, and private to remember that upon him 
individually devolved the duty of upholding the honor of the 
Stars and Stripes and carrying them to victory. The general 
was vociferously cheered as he rode away at the head of his 
staff. At eight o'clock precisely, by preconcerted movement, 
all the batteries opened simultaneously upon the German 
positions on the neighboring heights, the enemy replying 
vigorously. The noise of the cannonading is indescribable. 
From far and near, from northward and southward, as well as 
along our front, comes the unceasing, deafening roar of heavy 
siege guns, mingled with discordant reverberations and echoes 
from the mountain-sides. It is now late in the afternoon ; we 
have been under arms all day ; ambulances with wounded 
men have begun to come in along the post-road leading by our 
camp-ground to Gerardmer ; staff officers and couriers are 
dashing past in all directions ; but as yet we have had no 
orders to move. Williams of our company, who carried some 
water to a wounded Missourian in an ambulance, learned that 



84 ''BIETIGHEIM." 

the men have been exposed to a constant and heavy shelling at 
the front, but no engagement as yet. 

" Near Le Collet, January 5th, noon. — Last night the artillery 
firing was kept up without intermission, our men having got 
the range of the enemy's positions. About 10 p.m. the brigade 
was suddenly called to attention and marched down here to the 
front with other troops to re-enforce the reserves, as an attack 
from the enemy's infantry was looked for under cover of the 
darkness. They made none, however, and most of us, notwith- 
standing the racket, managed to get a few winks of broken 
sleep, lying down on our blankets wherever we happened to 
halt. It was a bright starlight, and the effect produced among 
the dark valleys by the constant flashes of firing was indescrib- 
ably grand, notwithstanding the excitement and discomfort of 
the surroundings. When morning dawned we found ourselves, 
with large numbers of other troops, massed in close columns 
of brigades a quarter of a mile or so to the westward of a little 
hamlet (Le Collet), and pretty well sheltered from the enemy's 
shells, though two men from our brigade have been carried off 
wounded. In Le Collet the shells — and enormous ones — have 
been falling thickly this morning, and every building has been 
destroyed. The signal officer, who had set up his telej)hone in 
one of them, was killed outright while in the act of communi- 
cating with General Terry at Eetournemer, and now the tele- 
phone service is being carried on from a knoll in the immedi- 
ate neighborhood of where our regiment lies. "Word comes 
that the advance of our left from Fraize under General Lee has 
been partially successful, and that a division of Virginians and 
North and South Carolinians have gained and held since day- 
break a strong foothold just over the enemy's line. This 
rumor, whether true or not, only stimulates our men's im- 
patience. The suspense is indeed dreadful. 

" Munster, January ^th.—Kj first thought as I reopen this 
note-book and take out my pencil to write is one of thankful- 
ness and wonder that I have been spared through all the dan- 
gers and terrors of the last three days. At last I realize what 
war really means. 

" When I made my last entry we were massed near Le Collet, 
prepared to attack. Half an hour later there came suddenly a 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AN'D COKSEQUENCES. 85 

lull — an inexplicable one — in the enemy's firing, and we were 
ordered to the assault. The men fixed bayonets and went for- 
ward at a run, the enemy's shells cutting long swathes through 
our advancing ranks. Directly before us, as we left Le Collet 
behind, was a broad open, sloping down to a brook, on the 
farther side of which the ground rose again some two hundred 
yards to a line of woods, in which the enemy's sharpshooters 
were thickly posted. Our first line (Potter's and Dewey's 
divisions) went across the oj^en, over the watercourse and up 
the other side, in sj)lendid alignment, leaving many dead and 
wounded as they went, yet instantly closing up the gaps, 
steadily pushing on shoulder to shoulder, and never wavering 
until they reached the edge of the woods, where thej halted to 
give three ringing Yankee cheers, afterward disappearing into 
the forest. Next came our line (Walton's and Buckley's 
divisions), at an interval of three hundred yards behind them, 
and before we had even reached the brook the men began to 
fall, for the enemy had now concentrated his fire on this spot, 
and was straining every effort to prevent us from gaining the 
cover of the opposite woods. Yet our line pressed firmly on. 
General Massey was shot dead from his horse just as he 
reached the farther side of the brook, and was gallantlj^ waving 
his sword and shouting to his command to follow him. 
Colonel Henry, of the Third Iowa, at once sprang forward to 
take his place, and though afoot, led the men at a run up to 
the verge of the forest. Then three more ringing Yankee 
cheers rent the air. The third line (James's and "Waterman's 
divisions) was already close behind us, and we pushed on up 
the steep wooded slope, now thickly strewn with the enemy's 
dead and wounded. The first line had by this time reached 
another cleared and comparatively level space farther up the 
mountain-side, and there met a terrific musketry fire from the 
enemy's infantry, whom they now for the first time en- 
countered in force. Our men charged at a run and went in 
with their bayonets. But the German troops stood like a 
stone wall, poured a square volley into their faces, and then 
engaged in a hand-to-hand struggle with the survivors. Of the 
two divisions of Potter and Dewey, which entered the attack 
fifteen thousand strong, not over one half reached the German 
line. One regiment alone, the Fifth Missouri, had all three of 



86 ^'BIETIGHEIM.'* 

its field officers, nine line officers, and over four hundred men 
killed on the field, and came out of the fight commanded by a 
first lieutenant. Our second line now charged down upon the 
enemy, bayonet in hand, as its predecessor had done, and 
speedily cleared the field, taking many prisoners. By the time 
our third line emerged, cheering, from the woods, the conflict, 
for the moment at least, was over, and the victory was ours. 

" I should like here to record my impressions on first seeing 
the German soldiers. I do not mean the poor fellows whom 
we saw wounded and dying on the ground about us as we 
charged up the wooded hillside, but the line of battle which 
we saw confronting our first line as it swept down upon them 
with the bayonet. It stood there as immovable as the rock- 
ribbed hills about it, looking like a military command on holi- 
day parade, while our men were approaching at the double- 
quick, with a long, glistening line of pointed steel. We saw all 
this as we emerged from the woods. Our first line was already 
within a hundred yards of the enemy, cheering and exultant ; 
then the German infantry, as one man, in an instant went 
through the 'Heady,' ' Aiin,^ 'Fire!' and belched forth a 
shower of lead that made our line recoil for an instant, and 
left a swathe of blue coats where it struck. I cannot imagine 
anything more heroic or more perfect in point of military 
order and discipline than this long line of helmeted soldiers, 
standing like a stone wall, delivering their fire as a single man, 
and then springing to the death-grapple with their foe. Their 
loss must have been enormous. Of the gallantry of our own 
men, most of whom were then brought for the first time under 
fire, I cannot say enough. Theirs was not the mechanical, 
clock-work discipline of their drilled opponents, but there was 
a vim, a dash, a determination in their charge that no human 
force could withstand. 

" The telephone field wires had speedil}'' followed us over the 
ground just won, and ten minutes later orders came from 
General Fairchild for the remnants of Potter's and Dewey's 
commands to fall back as reserves, until they could rally and 
reorganize. This brought our line to the front. As yet our 
losses had not been very heavy. Burke and Whitman of our com- 
pany were killed and Corporal Fulton wounded as we charged 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 87 

over the brook, and our whole regiment had lost perhaps fifty 
men in all, including Major Briggs, who was carried to the rear 
with a ball through the shoulder. But wo were not left long to 
count the casualties. With all the fury of a hurricane an artil- 
lery fire suddenly opened upon us from three sides, forcing 
our line to move off by the left flank and find partial shelter 
in a forest farther on. Meanwhile the enemy's infantry were 
ominously silent ; no re-enforcements had appeared to support 
the line we had driven with the bayonet ; our own troops were 
meantime reported as moving forward in force at all points, 
and as being engaged in storming batteries all along the line. 
But we soon found out where their infantry were. A sudden 
and violent fusillade, and then a continued rattling, tearing 
fire of musketry far to the rear presently reached our ears. 
The enemy had executed a daring flank movement under cover 
of their artillery fire and were pouring down, by brigade after 
brigade, upon our late positions at Le Collet, Retournemer, and 
Longemer. But we were prepared for them there. A message 
came from General Fairchild : ' Hold the ground you have 
won, and push forward where possible.' But meanwhile the 
attack on him was a desperate one. He had about twenty 
thousand men still in reserve in his strongly fortified camps to 
repel it. The German lines came up to the assault only to 
melt away like snow in July before the withering fire of cannon 
and rifles. I have learned since that one command succeeded 
in making a dash and planting the German colors on the very 
verge of our earthworks, but only to be driven back in a shat- 
tered and broken mass. The movement was heroic, btit vain. 
The assaulting party were driven back, and their fleeing and 
disordered remnants encountered once more those of our forces 
who had gained a foothold on their territory. The struggle 
was soon over. Our fresh divisions rushed impetuously upon 
them with the baj^onet, and they thus found themselves 
hemmed in front and rear, and were made prisoners to the last 
man. 

" The day was now already waning. It was nearly ionr 
o'clock, and the rays of the descending sun vainly strove to 
pierce the sulphurous cloud that had settled down like a pall 
over hill and valley. Yet for us the day was not done. ' Ad- 
vance,' came the order, and our line now led the van. Behind 



88 ^^BIETIGHEIM." 

US came James's and Waterman's divisions, and behind them, 
in turn, masses of blue coats whom the general had promptly 
pushed forward from the reserves as soon as the assault on our 
works was foiled. ' Forward,' was the word all along the 
line. ' Now, men, do your duty, and the day is ours 1 ' 
shouted our brigade commander, and off we started again, ad- 
vancing slowly and cautiously up a rockj", thinly- wooded moun- 
tain-side, keeping the best alignment that was possible under 
the circumstances. The cannonading had now ceased, and an 
ominous stillness reigned in our immediate vicinity. It was 
suddenly broken by an outburst of prolonged cheering and 
musketry firing far away to the left. The order came, ' Halt ! ' 
and we stood still where we were. The cheering and firing 
drew nearer and nearer, like an advancing storm sweeping down 
upon us. In less time than it takes me to tell it there came 
rolling upon us a solid wave of German infantry. They did 
not stop to cheer, to hurrah, to make any exultant demonstra- 
tions ; they simply moved forward upon us with fixed bayonets, 
like an advancing palisade of bristling steel. * Stand firm, 
men,' rang out clear and loud the voice of Colonel Henry, and 
the cry was scarcely repeated up and down the line ere the 
enemy was upon us. It was iron against iron, steel against 
steel, German courage and discipline against American courage 
and dash. I remember parrying the thrust of an officer's sword 
aimed at my throat, and of seeing him fall shot through the 
head by Color-Sergeant Bull ; there was a whirr, a clash, oaths, 
shrieks, groans, and then, with three cheers that ring in my 
ears jet, our second line came dashing in upon the assailants, 
and once more — ^though at dreadful cost — the field was ours. 
'Forward now, men, forward,' came the order, and those of 
us who survived rallied once more around the colors and 
pushed on up the slope. The passage was no longer ob- 
structed. The over-confident enemy had staked all his chances 
on the final assault at this point, and had lost. That evening 
at six we bivouacked above a gorge known as ' the Schlucht,' 
through which the post-road runs from Munster over the 
frontier to Gerardmer. By daylight we pushed on again, but 
encountered no enemy. The cannonading had not been re- 
newed. Suddenly came the joyful news that our Second Corps, 
under Fitzhugh Lee, had, after desperate fighting, reached 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 89 

Kaisersberg on the previous afternoon, thus outflanking the 
enemy, who had fallen back precipitately on Colmar. 

■!•;- ■«• Hs * "!fr * 

*' When we reached this place (Munster) we found it crowded 
with the enemy's wounded and dying ; detachments have been 
sent back to succor our own sufferers, and gather our dead 
comrades' bodies for burial. The losses have been terrible. 
Our regiment has been consolidated into six companies of 
eighty men each. Captains Watson, Bingham, Lowell, and 
Crooks are all killed, and First-Lieutenant Johnston of my com- 
pany is Ij'ing at Le Collet mortally wounded with a bayonet- 
thrust. We have only fourteen line officers left on duty. In 
Company B, which went into the fight sevent^'-six strong, only 
thirty-eight officers and men came out uninjured."] 

Tlie great battle of Plolieneck, a portion of which 
we have just heard described, was fought entirely 
by American and German troops, and has passed 
into history not only as the most desperate hand-to- 
hand encounter with the bayonet between heavy 
masses of troops that had ever been recorded, but 
also as a masterpiece of military strategy on the part 
of General Terry, the American commander. All 
the firmness and bravery displayed by the first 
corps on the right of the line on that day would 
have been unavailing but for the equal courage and 
endurance of the second corps, which, advancing 
from Fraize, outflanked the enemy's positions, and 
compelled his withdrawal to.the valley of the Rhine. 
The day had been one of varied chances, however ; 
for it must be remembered that the American troops 
formed scarcely a fifth part of the vast army which 
was closing in upon Strasbourg. There had been 
desperate and bloody battles at Belfort and Avri- 
court and at several other ifitermediate points, at 



90 ^^BIETIGHEIir." 

some of whicli the French and Spanish were vic- 
torious, at others drivenback with frightful carnage. 
General Boulanger was, however, quick to utilize 
the passage forced by the American troops, and 
within three days, by a dexterous and rapid concen- 
tration of his soldiers, threw two hundred thou- 
sand men into lower Alsace by way of Fraize, 
Gerardmer, and Belfort, leaving the remainder of 
his troops in the vicinity of Nancy and Avricourt 
to repel any flank movement aimed in the direction 
of Paris. 

It is not my purpose, my hearers, to rehearse to 
you in detail this evening the succession of bloody 
engagements in which the Imperial armies contested, 
step by step, the slow but irresistible advance of 
the Allies along the Rhine to Colmar, to Strasbourg, 
to Carlsruhe ; to tell how Metz fell by assault, and 
how the Allies vainly laid siege to the impregnable 
fortress at Coblentz ; to record the disasters that 
befell their arms in the memorable campaign against 
Cologne and the Prussian Rhine provinces ; all 
these are matters of history known to every school- 
boy. Suffice it to remind you that by the end of 
February, 1891, a concentration of forces on both 
sides was effected. The Imperialists had drawn five 
hundred thousand men from the armies defendino^ 
Cologne and Coblentz and massed them, for some 
unknown purpose, at Darmstadt. The remnants of 
their defeated armies from Metz and Strasbourg, 
still numbering in all some three hundred and fifty 
thousand men, occupied a line with its right resting 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSKQUENCP]S. 91 

on Mannheim and extending eastward across tlie 
Rhine valley to Heidelberg, and thence down the 
valley of the Keckar as far as Ileilbron. 

Of the Allied forces, most of the troops besieging 
Coblentz had been withdrawn by way of Trier and 
Saarbriicken to the neighborhood of the liliine op- 
posite Carlsruhe, where they had formed a junction 
with the victorious army of General Ducrot, ad- 
vancing eastward after the capture of Metz. These 
joint armies, four hundred and fifty thousand 
strong, crossed the Rhine at Hheinbad late in Feb- 
ruary and took up a position with their left resting 
on that point and extending thence in a semicircle 
through Carlsruhe and Bruchsal to Muhlacker, an 
important railroad junction on the northerly verge 
of the Black Forest, and on the Wtirtemberg fron- 
tier. The Army of the Yosges, which, notwithstand- 
ing its severe campaigning, had still about two hun- 
dred and fifty thousand men available for active 
service, was massed on the Rhine plain, in the 
vicinity of Rastadt, ready to co-operate with the 
other army as occasion might render necessary. 
The manifest disparity of the forces now arrayed 
caused the Allied leaders unmistakable alarm, espe- 
cially as the Imperialists were evidently meditating 
some daring movement, the nature of which it w^as 
impossible to divine. Under these circumstances, 
hurried orders were sent to General Cirrey, com- 
manding the Army of the North, which, after its 
defeat before Cologne, had fallen back on Yerviers, 
to detach with all possible haste two hundred thou- 
sand men for the re-enforcement of the Allied forces 



92 ''^BIETIGHEIM." 

around Carlsrulie. This could the better be done at 
this stage of the campaign for the reason that Bel- 
gium had during January finally cast in her lot with 
the Allies and put in the field seventy-five thou- 
sand men who were now ready to assume the defen- 
sive and replace to some extent the troops detached 
by General Cirrey. The movement was promptly 
begun, and as soon as the fresh troops began to ar- 
rive the Allied leaders took fresh courage, and, with- 
out waiting for the enemy to assume the initiative, 
determined to bring on a general engagement at 
once. To this end the right of the line was pushed 
forward from Muhlacker toward Bietigheim, an im- 
portant railroad junction, the possession of which 
would virtually outflank the enemy's left wing at 
Heilbron. It w^as a desperate move, but one which, 
if successful, would prove almost certain victory to 
the Allies. Bietigheim controlled the main Trans- 
Continental railway line from Paris to Vienna, and 
was also the junction point from which connection 
was made north-westward to Heilbron, Frankfort, 
and the lower Rhine, and north-eastward, vial^xirn- 
berg, to Berlin. To seize this point, outflank the 
astonished Imperialists, and leave them the alter- 
native of falling back or delivering battle with the 
Allies on a field of the latter' s own choosing — this 
was the plan decided upon in a council of war which 
assembled at Carlsruhe on the 21tli of February, 
1891.. 

The movement began on the following day, it 
being calculated that the re-enforcements from 
General Cirrey would all be on the scene of action 




'<^ JiO 00 ^0 so ^O /O dP y^ /<70 //O /2J /J a 

MAP OF SEAT OF WAR FROM STRASBOURG TO BIETIGHEIM. 



X 



-•,-,'>»J-'.\ V 



^1 



ai A AW 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 93 

witliin tlie next forty-eight hours. Some thirty 
thousand of them liad arrived at or near Carlsrnlie, 
forty thousand were ah-eady to Saarbriicken, eighty 
tliousand were en route at Luxembourg, and the re- 
mainder at various points between there and Yer- 
viers, yet being forwarded with all possible speed to 
tlie coming theatre of w^ar. Accordingly, on the 
morning of February 25fcli two army corps of 
French and American troops were pushed forward 
from Miihlacker toward Bietigheim, meeting at first 
with but little opposition, so unexpected was the 
movement. Heavy reserves from Bruchsal and 
Pforzheim were hurried forward with orders to keep 
within supporting distance of the vanguard, and 
the troops from Carlsruhe were advanced to replace 
them, their places in turn being taken by the troops 
from Cxeneral Cirrey as fast as they arrived. Simul- 
taneously the Army of the Yosges was ordered to 
move by the right from its position on the Khine 
plain around Rastadt and Baden-Baden, and passing 
by forced marches through the Black Forest, to fol- 
low down the valley of the Enz to Bietigheim. The 
enemy quickly perceived the movement, and at first 
evidently took it as merely a feint, and made but 
slight effort to resist it. So engrossed were they 
with their own projected piece of strategy, what- 
ever it was, that they failed to realize that their 
opponents had indeed been the first to open the ball 
and bring on a general engagement. Bat when the 
movement had fully developed, and it was seen that 
the entire Allied armies had taken the aggressive 
and were moving as one man by an organized and 



94 "bietigheim." 

preconcerted movement upon a vitally important 
strategic point, then the Imperialists suddenly awoke 
to a consciousness that their schemes had gone aglee 
— that they had been caught napping. But their 
dispositions of troops to meet the new emergency 
were promptly made. Two hundred thousand inen 
were hurried up the IS^eckar Yalley to Heilbron 
and thence to Lauffen, a few miles farther up the 
stream, where tliey formed a line of battle facing 
southward, with its right resting at a point called 
Brackenheim ; another army of four hundred thou- 
sand Imperial troops, mostly Russians and Austrians, 
were started eastward from Heidelberg and ordered 
to occupy a line extending from north-west to south- 
east, the right resting on Jagstfeld on the lN"eckar. 
The balance, two hundred and fifty thousand Ger- 
man troops, were brought down from Darmstadt to 
the Khine plain between Heidelberg and Mannheim 
and there held in readiness to be flung suddenly 
upon any point within striking distance. All these 
movements took up the best part of the 25th, 26th 
and 27th of February. During their execution 
there was little or no skirmishing among the oppos- 
ing forces, but all the lines of railroads and all the 
post-roads and higliways converging toward the 
destined scene of action were thronged with artil- 
lery, cavalry, and infantry, and the grim spectre of 
impending battle hovered over all. 

On the night of February 2Yth, all along the val- 
ley of the lower Neckar, and over a wide expanse 
of the o])en, undulating country to the east, south, 
and west, blazed the countless bivouac fires of the 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CON"SEQUEN"CES. 95 

miglity armies toward wliicli the eyes of the civil- 
ized world were anxiously turned, and upon which 
depended the political destinies of Europe. It was 
indeed a solemn moment, and one pregnant with 
weal or woe for the cause of civilization and of 
liberty. Here stood the Imperial despotism of the 
olden times, arrayed in all its gorgeous panoply, and 
confident in all the might of modern warfare. Here 
stood, confronting it, the enlightened freedom of 
"Western Europe and of the New World, eager to do 
it battle then and there in the sacred cause of 
progress and humanity. Hero were a million and 
a half of men sleeping on their arms and awaiting a 
morrow which for many of them was to be the last 
on earth. Senseless and unfeeling indeed must he 
have been who could have stood in the midst of such 
a solemn scene on that starlight night, and gazing 
on the silent hosts around him, or reverting to his 
loved home and anxious friends far away, been in- 
different to the thought of what for him, for his 
comrades, for his country, his cause, the morrow 
should have in store. 

Long before dawn all was in motion : long lines 
of infantry moving into position, batteries being 
planted on every available height, and fresh troops 
constantly arriving on the ground from all direc- 
tions. The prompt seizure of the heights on both 
sides of the Enz Yalley, overlooking Bietigheim, by 
the French and American advance, had secured the 
Allies an immense advantage ; so too had the pos- 
session of the railway viaduct, a stone structure a 



96 " BIETIGHEIM. " 

quarter of a mile long, crossing the stream at that 
point, which had been fortified, and now bristled 
with cannon pointed up the valley. Daylight dis- 
covered the Imperialists strongly entrenched on the 
heights extending westward from the Neckar at 
Kirchheim, where, with incredible speed and activ- 
ity, they had mounted hundreds of guns of the 
heaviest calibre ; they had also occupied the heights 
along the l^eckar from Kirchheim down to Gem- 
mingheim, and planted batteries at every available 
point. Their infantry, massed by close columns of 
divisions in solid blocks of forty thousand men each, 
had been advanced to within supporting distance of 
the artillery. The Allies had the advantage in posi- 
tion, however, for they had occupied all of the nu- 
merous knobs and hills rising abruptly out of the 
comparatively level landscape to the north and west 
of Bietigheim, and had made them all but impregna- 
ble to assault. Their cannon were also thickly plant- 
ed on the range of hills extending north-westward 
from the Sachsenheims to Ilohen Raslach. Their 
infantry was similarly massed in solid blocks ready 
to support the artillery. At and around Bietigheim 
village were seventy thousand men, consisting of 
French troops and General Gibbon's (Third) Ameri- 
can corps from the victorious army of Metz. These 
troops were all from New England and New York, 
as were also the greater part of General Miles's 
(Fourth) corps, which was -massed at Gross Sachsen- 
heim, twenty thousand strong. The Army of the 
Yosges was massed in reserve along the Enz to the 
south-west of Bietigheim. Upon its commander, 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CON"SEQUENCES. 97 

General Boulaiiger, liad devolved, as ranking officer, 
the leadership of the Allied armies on that eventful 
day. The Crown Prince of Germany was present 
directing in person at Heilbron the movements of 
the Imperial army. 

It were idle, my hearers, for one to attempt, in 
the space of a single lecture, to give a description of 
tliis memorable engagement, which brought into 
action a million and a lialf of soldiers, covered 
an area of twenty square miles of territory, con- 
tinued without intermission for four days, witnessed 
repeated encounters, marked by the most desper- 
ate valor, be"tween immense bodies of troops, and 
left over two hundred thousand men dead upon the 
field. It has oft and truly been said that Bietig- 
heim ranks first and foremost among the decisive 
battles of the world's history ; certainly upon no 
other field has there ever been displayed a more 
reckless valor, a more determined resistance, a more 
persistent sacrifice of human lives. It was as if a 
dozen ordinary battles were being fought simultane- 
ously side by side, each without regard to the prog- 
ress of the other. Tens of thousands of men were 
hurled headlong upon belching batteries as if their 
lives w^ere worth no more than those of so many 
sheep or cattle, and when they had fallen tens of 
thousands of others were found to take their places 
only to meet a similar fate. It was a carnival of 
carnage, which ended only with the sheer exhaus- 
tion of the surviving combatants. Looking back to 
those four days into which, for him who addresses 



98 '^BIETIGHEIM. ' 

you, seem to have been crowded the experiences of 
a century, it is difficult to realize how any other than 
the possessor of a charmed life could have come out 
unharmed from that deadly rain of iron, lead, and 
steel, from that pandemonium where all the horrors 
and sufferings of the infernal regions seemed to 
ha^'C been let loose to blight and wither the fair 
face of God's earth. Let those of you who here in 
America, during those days of agony and suspense, 
watched and waited for news from that distant 
battle-field, recall the alternations of grief and joy, 
of hope and despair, which came flashed to you 
under the ocean's depths, in hourly bulletins, from 
the scene of action. To the younger members of 
my audience, whose memories do not reach back to 
that eventful period, I can perhaps give no better 
idea of the varying phases of the battle than to 
quote here some of those bulletins, as I find them 
in the New York Herald of that date : 

{By Mackay-Benneit Cable.) 

" Muhlacker, February 28ih, 3 p.m. — The engagement has now 
become general. Two Kussian and an Austrian army corps, 
estimated eighty thousand strong, have seized Gross Bottwar, 
and are moving southward on Steinheim and Marbach to turn 
our right flank. General Miles with forty thousand men has 
seized the junction at Beihingen, and posted a heavy artillery 
force on the adjacent heights. Ee-enforcements are being 
pushed forward to him with all possible haste. On our left the 
French and Spanish troops have advanced and occupied 
Cleebronn, threatening the enemy' s right flank, and compelling 
the withdrawal of some of his artillery. A desperate engage- 
ment between French and Germans is reported to have taken 
place at Wahlheim, where fifty thousand men were engaged on 
both sides. The French were forced back upon Lochgau and 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AITD CONSEQUENCES. 99 

Besiglieim with heavy losses, but our artillery prevented the 
enemy's further advance. The cannonading continues with- 
out intermission. As yet none of the American troops have 
been engaged. 

" Later, 4, p.m. — The signal corps reports heavy bodies of the 
enemy's infantry moving off by the left flank from Heilbron 
and Laufen. This indicates an intended attack in force upon 
our right. The Russians and Austrians have halted at Stein- 
heim, evidently waiting to be re-enforced. A desperate battle 
is in jDrogress for the recovery of Cleebronn. General Cirrey's 
troops are arriving in force from Saarbriicken and Luxem- 
bourg. Two corps were sent forward this morning from Carls- 
ruhe to the front. 

"5 p.m. — The enemy have recaptured Cleebronn and driven 
our line back to Freudenthal with terrific loss on both sides. 
The German infantry made three successive charges, the last of 
which was successful, but it is estimated to have cost them not 
less than fifteen thousand men. The French General of 
Division Mallot, and a host of field and line officers were killed. 
The victorious Germans, under Von Schlemwitz, are now push- 
ing forward upon Freudenthal, the capture of which would 
compel the withdrawal of much of the artillery on our left. 
General Ducrot has ordered forward the corps of Arnot and 
Du Vivier to oppose von Schlemwitz's advance. 

" 8 P.M. — The day's operations have undoubtedly been favor- 
able in the main to the Imperialists, who have now concen- 
trated a heavy force, estimated at two hundred and fifty thou- 
sand men, opposite our right, ready to attack to-morrow, and 
have also advanced their lines from one to two miles along our 
entire front. General Cirrey's troops are being hurried for- 
ward with all possible dispatch ; and the entire Army of the 
Vosges has been ordered uf), under command of General Terry, 
to support the Allied right at Beihingen and Bietigheim. 
Notwithstanding to-day's repulse, the troops are in good spirits ; 
but everything indicates desperate fighting on the right to- 
morrow. The Herald balloon at Bietigheim reports all the 
roads to the north and east crowded with the enemy's infantry 
moving in the direction of Gross Bottwar, Steinheim, and Mar- 
bach. 

*' March Isi, noon. — The enemy's plan of battle is now fully 



100 '^BIETIGHEIM." 

developed. It is to fall npon the Allies' right flank at Bietig- 
heim in overwhelming force, at the same time advancing his 
reserves on the Rhine plain, and carrying Carisruhe by assault, 
thus cutting off further re-enforcements from General Cirrey, 
and hemming General Boulanger in on all sides, except the 
south. This movement began at daylight this morning. The 
Imperialists during the night had posted batteries along the 
heights from Marbach to Pleidelsheim, and also south of our 
advance posts around Neckarweihingen, and at half -past six 
opened a tremendous fire. After two hours' cannonading their 
infantry appeared in strong force, advancing across the open 
country, from the north, east, and south, in long double lines, 
half a mile apart. The Allied forces had been under arms since 
5 A.M., and the artillery did good execution at long range. 
During the night General Boulanger advanced the Army of the 
Vosges to Geissingen and Hietingsheim, and threw forward the 
main body of the troops into the peninsula formed by a long 
bend in the Neckar at this point. It is a natural fortress, a 
semicircle of hills, with the river skirting their base, and but 
one bridge— at Marbach— by which it is approachable from the 
direction of the enemy's advance. The latter came on, how- 
ever, equipped with pontoon trains, and prepared to cross at a 
number of points. The pontoniers worked under a heavy fire 
of cannon and musketry, but finally planted their bridges, and 
over a hundred thousand Bussians and Germans have already 
crossed. 

" 4 P.M. — The Allies have up to this time held their fortified 
position in the bend of the Neckar in spite of the most persist- 
ent and bloodj' attempts of the enemy to dislodge them. At 
noon thirty thousand Bussian infantry made a desperate 
charge up the heights at Benningen, but were handsomely 
repulsed by Gibbon's (Third) corps, who afterward made a 
sortie and drove them back down the heights and into the 
river. A second charge was attempted at the same point at one 
o'clock, this time by fifty thousand Germans and Bussians 
Tinder General Von Bomer. The French division of Brasseur 
had been ordered up to re-enforce Gibbon, and again the 
charge was repulsed, but with enormous losses. The enemy, 
not discouraged, rallied another fifty thousand men, and, an 
hour later, once more charged desperately up the hill. Gib- 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 101 

bon's and Brasseur's men had meanwhile been further re- 
enforced by Major-General Dawson's left wing of Fitzhugh 
Lee's (Second) corps from the Army of the Yosges ; and none 
too soon, either, for the Virginians, Carolinians, and Georgians, 
who had come up on a double-quick to the front, had scarcely 
recovered their breath ere they were called upon to go into 
action. The Imperialists advanced steadily up the hill in 
three solid lines, and this time the flower of their troops had 
been sent to the assault. But they were doomed. On they 
came, the grape and canister cutting long gaps in their ranks, 
yet the survivors pressing onward and upward with dogged, 
undaunted determination. Again the Allies rushed out of the 
works to meet them with the bayonet, the Fifth New York of 
Barnum's division leading the charge. It was short, sharp, 
and decisive. Some of the Germans, it is true, pushed on over 
everything and reached even the mouths of the Boston battery's 
guns ; but not one of them ever went back. 

*' The American losses have been heavy in to-daj^'s action, the 
New York and New England troops having borne the brunt of 
the assaults at Benningen. But the slaughter of the enemy 
must have been tenfold greater, the slope where they charged 
being literally covered with their dead and wounded. 

" 6 P.M.— There has been bloody fighting at the bridge at 
Marbach and at two or three other points beyond, where the 
enemy had placed their pontoons ; but in every case the Allies 
have held their positions and inflicted severe loss upon their 
assailants. At latest advices (5.30 p.m.) it is not considered 
probable that the enemy will renew the attack to-day at that 
point. Heavy shells have been falling all day far within the 
Allied lines. The railway viaduct and most of the buildings at 
Bietigheim are in ruins. There has also been heavy fighting 
at various other points. The Allies took the aggressive against 
the enemy's right at noon, and threw forward three French 
and one Spanish corps toward Brackenheim and Kirchheim, 
both of which they occupied with comparatively little resist- 
ance. The rear-guard of the Army of the Vosges was vigor- 
ously attacked by a cavalry force composed of five thousand 
Uhlans, who succeeded in capturing a large number of 
wounded and stragglers. 

" 7 P.M.— Every thing indicates that the fighting is over for to- 



102 ^^BIETIGHEIM." 

day. The Imperialists have been held in check on the right, 
and thus far have failed in their plans ; but the situation is 
still menacing, and there must be much desperate fighting in 
any case before the issue is decided, A further concentration 
of their forces is in progress. The enemy, apparently in view 
of to-day's events, has made no attack on Carlsruhe ; but the 
entire Imperialist reserve, which had been destined for that 
purpose, is reported in motion toward Heidelberg and Heil- 
bron. Cirrey's troops from Verviers have all arrived, and 
with the exception of those detailed to guard the line of com- 
munication from the Ehine to the Neckar, have gone forward 
to the front. The great bulk of both armies now confront each 
other at and around Bietigheim, the Allied line extending from 
Gross Sachsenheim to the Neckar near Marbach. 

*' March 2d, morning, — The Allied arms have encountered a 
serious and what might have proved, but for American valor, 
a fatal disaster. Under cover of night the Imperialists 
brought two hundred thousand infantry, under General von 
Ehrenstein, around to the vicinity of Ludwigsburg, crossing 
the Neckar at Hochberg and Neckar Ems, and at daylight 
hurled this force, from the southward, upon the Allied flank. 
The attack came so unexpectedly that a panic ensued. General 
du Sellier's division, which caught the first brunt of the on- 
slaught, broke and ran, spreading the panic among the Spanish 
troops of General Quintero's division, who also joined in the 
flight. The sudden firing from an unexpected quarter brought 
the entire army to attention ; but the Germans and Austrians 
came on with a rush, carrying camp after camp and earthwork 
after earthwork, until it seemed certain that the thought of 
further staying their advance was vain. Their first check, how- 
ever, was when they encountered the French divisions of Val- 
court and Meurier. These are troops who have seen much 
active service in Algiers and Tonquin, and are not likely to 
turn and run when surprised. They gallantly received the 
enemy's onset, and engaged him so long as resistance was pos- 
sible, but at cost of leaving two thirds of their number on the 
field. Yet this gave General Terry, whose two corps were the 
next to be attacked, an opportunity to prepare for fight. The 
Imperialists, elated with success and now over-confident of 
victory, came rushing on at a double-quick upon Terry's 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 103 

position, when suddenly, like a stone wall across their path, 
arose a line of blue coats, and then another, and another ; yet 
on they came, still eighty or ninety thousand strong, while 
Terry's force at most was not over half that number. He had, 
however, speedily telephoned to Gibbon and Miles, who were 
near at hand, urging them to hasten to his support ; and 
hasten they did. 

'* 'Stand firm, now, every man of j/ow, ' shouted the gallant Fair- 
child as the enemy came down upon him ; ' we Americans can 
save the day yet.' Then came the crash. It was a hand-to- 
hand bayonet light ; but the Americans stood firm, and Von 
Ehrenstein saw then, for the first time, that his victorious 
advance was ended. While the troops of Fairchild and Lee 
were holding him in check, Gibbon and Miles came dashing in 
on his flank, and Audibert's (French) corps, which had been 
ordered too late to the support of Valcourt and Meurier, closed 
in upon him from the rear. He was hemmed in on all sides, 
and his men were falling so fast that further resistance seemed 
but useless carnage. He determined to cut his way out, if 
possible. Moving his men suddenly by the right flank, he 
encountered the troops of Miles ; it was vain. Fairchild closed 
in, with Audibert upon his rear, and forced him to about-face 
again and defend himself. Only a forlorn hope of two brigades, 
with Yon Ehrenstein at their head, succeeded in reaching and 
fording the Neckar and making good their escape, taking with 
them several hundred prisoners from Terry's command. Of 
the hundred thousand assailants, sixty thousand are now pris- 
oners in General Terry's hands. The remainder, with the 
exception of the two brigades that escaped with Von Ehren- 
stein, are lying dead or wounded on the field. 

" 11 A.M. — The enemy have evacuated Marbach, after destroy- 
ing the bridge and setting fire to the town. Schiller's birth- 
place is in ashes. They are now massing the remainder of 
their forces at Pleidelsheim and Steinheim. The balloon 
signal-men report heavy re-enforcements pouring in by waj^ of 
Heilbron and Lauffen ; these are no doubt the forces that were 
to have attacked Carlsruhe. Including these, the enemy can 
still muster over four hundred thousand men against us. The 
Allies, counting all of Cirrey's newJy-arrived soldiers, number 
over five hundred and fifty thousand ready for action, but both 



104 *'BIETIGHEIM." 

men and horses are beginning to show the results of the last 
three days' terrible strain upon them. 

" 2 P.M.— The enemy, adopting the Allied tactics, endeavored 
to entrench himself in a similar bend in the Neckar at Hessi»- 
heim, but was frustrated and driven back with considerable 
loss. Emboldened by his strong re-enforcements, he has 
actively resumed the offensive, crossing the Neckar in great 
force at Wahiheim, Ottmarsheim, and Besigheim, with the 
evident intention of silencing the batteries and overwhelming 
the Allied left. 

*' 5 P.M. — An infantry battle, in which not less than two hun- 
dred and lifty thousand troops were brought into action on 
each side, has been in progress since early this afternoon, in 
the open country to the north-west of Bietigheim. The 
manoeuvring of these heavy bodies of men is described by the 
Herald balloon correspondent as evincing the most consummate 
military strategy on both sides. Our artillery firmly holds its 
position on several knobs or hills which command the entire 
battle-field, and has been doing deadly execution, notwith- 
standing repeated and persistent attempts to dislodge it. 
Nothing decisive as yet. 

" 8 P.M. — The troops of both armies are resting on their arms 
wherever darkness overtook them. The results of this after- 
noon's bloody fighting are entirely indecisive and unsatisfac- 
tory. Cheering news comes, however, that the Allied right, a 
hundred and fifty thousand strong, and including the entire 
American contingent, has been pressing the retiring enemy 
northward from Marbach since noon, and will be in position 
to close in upon him to-morrow. The best military authority 
is credited with the statement that this terrible contest cannot 
possibly be protracted longer than to-morrow at sundown. 
The sacrifice of life has been unparalleled in the annals of 
warfare, and the country is covered with the dead, and with the 
wounded and dying, for whom it is impossible to care. 

*' March 3d, 9 a.m.— The agonies of the wounded, who are still 
lying helpless and neglected all over the wide extent of country 
over which the contending armies have fought, are spoken of 
as indescribable, yet neither commander has proposed a truce 
in order to afford them relief. On the contrary, the slaughter 
was renewed this morning with increased vigor by the fresh 



klTS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEC^UENCES. 105 
oops on both sides, on the battle-ground of yesterday after- 
noon. Our correspondent reports that the Allied right, which 
forced the enemy northward from Marbach yesterday, crossed 
the Neckar in the night, and by a forced march is closing in 
upon the main body of the Imperial forces now opj^osite our 
left. If this prove true, it will undoubtedly give the Allies the 
victory. 

" 11 A.M. — An hour ago the Imperialists made a desperate but 
unsuccessful attempt to dislodge our artillery from their 
positions near the Weisenhof and the Spinnerei, from both of 
which points the lire has been especially destructive. Since 
then there has been a perceptible diminution in the vigor of 
their fighting at all points. The Allies are advancing and 
pushing them hard at every point. 

" Noon. — The Herald balloon correspondent reports that the 
shattered and weakened Imperial forces were struck on the 
flank at Lochgau half an hour ago by the right wing of General 
Boulanger's army, which had crossed the Neckar at night, and 
came up by a forced march. A panic ensued, and the enemy 
is now in full retreat upon Heilbron, leaving most of his artil- 
lery and many thousands of prisoners in our hands. His 
escape is considered impossible. 

"2 P.M. — A force of ten thousand Allied cavalry, mostly 
French dragoons, which had been in reserve at Bretten, moved 
rapidly down the post-road to Brackenheim and intercepted 
the enemy's flight at Diirrenzimmer and Nordhausen. A lively 
engagement between cuirassiers and Uhlans is also reported 
to have occurred at the bridge at Lauffen. The enemy con- 
tinues in full flight. 

" 9 P.M. — The enemy TTAR SUEKENDEBED UNCONDITIONAUiY." 

I leave it to your imagination, mj liearcrs, to 
picture the agony and suspense prevailing tlirougli- 
out the country during these four days of a battle 
where every household in the land was represented 
by some loved relative, friend, or acquaintance. So 
terrible were the losses, so protracted the uncertainty, 
that, notwithstanding the thrilling news of victory, 



106 *'BIETIGHEIM." 

the battle was regarded as a great national calamity. 
Tlie cables — there were but six then— were choked 
with messages, the newspapers filled with lists of 
the dead, wounded, and missing, and the entire land 
was wrapped in grief and mourning which even the 
consciousness of victory so dearly purchased could 
not assuage. The President decreed March 12th as 
a day of national fasting, humiliation, and prayer, 
and its observance was both earnest and general 
throughout the nation. Throughout Europe, too, 
a deep, crushing sense of horror was uppermost in 
the public mind, contemplating that ghastly field 
where over two hundred thousand dead bodies were 
being buried as rapidly as possible, and where for 
miles around, in every available building that was 
left standing, as many more wounded sufferers were 
awaiting recovery or death. 

The victory of the Allies was complete. Articles 
of surrender were drawn up at Heilbron on the fol- 
lowing day, and two days later Coblentz capitulated, 
through the disaffection of the Russian troops form- 
ing a part of its garrison. Indications of serious 
discord were apparent in the Imperial ranks, Rus- 
sians, Austrians, and Germans each striving to throw 
upon the other the responsibility of defeat. The 
Allied armies, meanwhile, withdrew to the Rhine 
plain, and there awaited the conclusion of a peace, 
which could not be long deferred. Early in May 
the Treaty of Carlsruhe was signed. Its terms were 
humiliating to the Imperial signatories, but it must 
be remembered they had been written by the sword 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 107 

in letters of blood. Germany re-ceded to France 
Alsace and Lorraine, with a war indemnity of one 
milliard of francs ($200,000,000) to that coilntry, 
$100,000,000 to the United States, and $50,000,000 
to Spain. Russia evacuated Herat and Constan- 
tinople, and gave England an indemnity of £25,- 
000,000 and ample guarantees against re-occupa- 
tion. Austria paid Italy five hundred million lira 
($100,000,000) as indemnification, and accorded her 
certain special shipping privileges in the port of 
Trieste. The signing of this treaty v^as the occa- 
sion for many remarkable speeches deploring the 
horrors of war and advocating measures for a general 
disarmament and the perpetuation of permanent 
peace among the nations. Who can recall, save 
with a sense of admiration and conviction, the elo- 
quent peroration of our venerable statesman, Mr. 
Evarts, when, on that occasion, in the presence of 
the titled diplomats of Europe, he spoke these 
memorable words : 

*' In conclusion, Mr. President, I here renew, in the name of 
Christianity, in the name of humanity, that appeal for peace 
which the United States of America sent from beyond the 
Atlantic a twelvemonth ago to the nations of the Old World 
then girding themselves for battle. At that time the entreaty 
fell upon unheeding ears ; the still small voice of the angel 
pleading for peace was drowned in the hoarse, discordant tones 
of the unchained demon of strife. But now that the storm has 
swept over us ; now that the peoples of Europe and America are 
bowed in grief in the presence of a common, all-pervading 
woe ; now that in every household, be it palace or cabin, the 
voice of weeping and wailing is heard for those who have fallen 
on yonder field — in this the hush following the tempest, is it 
not the chosen moment in which the New World may once 



108 "BIETIGHEIM." 

more stretch out her hands iinto the Old, and pointing to yoh 
ghastly spectacle, exclaim, in the name of the thousands of 
widows and orphans who to-day are weeping, in the name of 
common humanity, in the name of God, ' Let us have peace ' " ? 

The conclusion of the treaty was -made the occa- 
sion of signal rejoicings everywhere, even in the 
defeated countries, for the impression was general 
that an era of universal and ' enduring peace had 
finally been crystallized out of the white-hot fur- 
nace of war. Yet even these rejoicings were tem- 
pered by the prevalence of personal sorrow and be- 
reavement. I^ever before had grim War left such 
widespread blight, poverty, and desolation in his 
path. The treasure and blood which had been 
poured out like water had left a lack which only 
the flight of long years could eiface. 

But you are perhaps curious to learn what, dur- 
ing all these momentous events, has become of our 
young Kansas officer and his note-book. Where a 
million or more of men are brought into action, the 
individual is certain to dwindle in importance, and 
the personal adventures of this one or that one in 
the human ant-hill become matters of insignificance. 
Yet since you have listened previously to some of 
his recitals, it may interest you to know this much, 
that he got a ball in the shoulder and was carried 
off a prisoner to Lud wigs burg with the two brigades 
that cut their way out with Yon Ehrenstein ; that 
he was humanely cared for in a German military 
hospital at that place until his wound healed, and 
that he rejoined his command at Durlachafew days 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 100 

before tlie conclusion of the treaty of peace. Tlie 
next important entry which his note-book records 
is the following : 

" Paris, June 16th, 1891. — This has been the proudest day of 
my life. The American troops have been fairly overwhelmed 
with attentions and honors at every point on the long line of 
march. The review was simply magnilicent as a militarj' 
pageant. General Terry was given the right of the line, with 
Fairchild's corps leading and Lee's next ; then came Gibbon 
and Miles, then the English, Italians, and Spaniards, the 
French troops bringing up the rear. The route, extending 
from the Bois de Bologne, by way of the Arc de Triomphe, 
Champs Elj^sees, Place de la Concorde, Eue Eoyale, and Grand 
Boulevard to the Place Juillet, was lined on both sides for the 
entire distance with the troops of the Army of Paris and the 
National Guard, facing inward, and standing at ' Present 
Arms.' I find no words in which to convey any idea of the 
enthusiastic demonstrations of the French populace at the 
sight of our war-worn blue uniforms and torn, battle-stained 
flags. Our brigade was the second from the right of the line, 
and came in for a large share of the popular acclamation. As 
we passed under the Arc de Triomphe, our band playing 
* Yankee Doodle,' the scene was simply indescribable, but is 
indelibly imprinted upon my memory ; and I shall be proud to 
the last day of my life that I participated in its honors. On 
the Place de la Concorde, the statue of Strasbourg was deco- 
rated with garlands, and above it floated a silk banner inscribed, 
"Welcome to our Liberators. " Across the Boulevard, at the 
Place de I'Opera, was an arch of roses, inclosing the simple 
word " Bietigheim" in evergreens. From the summit of the 
Portes St. Denis and St. Martin floated the flags of all the 
Allied nations, decked with laurel leaves, and on the top of the 
Column of July was a colossal white-winged figure, typifying 
the Angel of Peace. 

* ^ * * * •?«• 

The remainder of the story is soon told. History 
records no more grateful or enthusiastic welcome 



110 Vbietigheim." 

than that accorded to the brave American survivors 
of Bietigheim, when they once more set foot on 
their country's soil. The flags which they followed 
through the dire storm of battle and brought back 
crowned with victory are now enshrined at their re- 
spective State Capitols as the proudest trophies of 
American prowess and the vindication of the 
proudest rights of American citizenship. 

Thirty- three years after the events just described^ 
my hearers, he who now addresses you revisited the 
battle-field of Bietigheim, and stood once more 
upon the heights overlooking the !Neckar at Ben- 
ningen, where the Americans had fought so bravely 
and so well. The soft purple haze of a summer 
evening sunset hovered over the quiet, peaceful 
landscape, and nothing remained to tell of the mad 
passions that had once surged and ebbed over that 
now tranquil scene save the long lines of moss- 
covered gravestones within the inclosure, which, 
under treaty provisions, was made over by Germany 
to our Government for maintenance as a National 
Cemetery. 

Honest toil had resumed its wonted sway, the 
ruined villages had been rebuilt, the grain fields, 
once trampled under the iron footprints of charging 
infantry, now rustled with waving wheat, and the 
Neckar, winding like a silver band across the misty 
landscape, gave no remembrance that it had once 
run red with the life-blood of the youth of two con- 
tinents. All save the tombstones had passed away ; 
but they, in silent, solemn alignment, w^ere still 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. Ill 

standing there, making tlieir mute appeal and seem- 
ing to ask, ^' Have these brave men indeed died in 
vain ?" And the answer comes long and loud from 
a grateful country far away across the sea, and 
from all friends of liberty throughout the world : 
*' No ! these men gave up their lives to humble 
the arrogance of Imperial military despotism and 
vindicate to the world the principles of republican 
popular government. No ! they have not died in 
vain. ' ' 



III. 

ITS CONSEQUENCES. 

BiETiaHEiM not only made the world weep, it 
set the European people to thinking, and, later, to 
acting. It admonished the monarch on his throne 
that a time had already come when the right to the 
rulership of an intelligent people must be based on 
something more than mere heredity ; to the aris- 
tocracy it whispered a warning that the day of any 
other ranks or titles than those based on individual 
merit was drawing to an end ; it reminded the 
middle classes that in them, the possessors of the 
wealth and intelligence of the land, was in reality 
vested the controlling influence for its welfare ; and 
to the masses — the artisan, the laborer, the peasant 
— it unveiled all the hollowness and falsity of the 
tinsel idols of tradition to which they had been 
asked to bow down. 

It was evident early in 1893 that a general social 
revolution was impending in Europe. That it might 
prove a bloodless one many yet believed. The 
carnage at Bietigheim had borne good fruit in allay- 
ing the sanguinary feelings of even the more ad- 
vanced radicals and socialists, and in disposing 
people of all political creeds and opinions to a 
settlement of their differences by arbitration and 



it 



BIETIGHEIM.'* 113 



legislation wherever it could possibly be effected. 
Since tlie re-entry of the defeated troops at Berlin, 
St. Petersburg, and Vienna, liberalism had made in- 
credible strides, not only in those capitals, but 
throughout the countries which they ruled. When 
the German Reichstag assembled in Novemljcr, 
1892, two thirds of its members were more or less 
republican in sentiment. The Austrian Parliament 
was even more radical, in that its Pepublican mem- 
bers, while not more numerous than in the Reich- 
stag, possessed less statecraft and self-control. In 
Russia Nihilism had been rejDlaced by what was 
called the '' People's Union," with '^ Education and 
Freedom " as its motto. This Bund, or Union, com- 
prised nearly every man in the empire save the court, 
the nobility, the higher military officials, and a small 
sprinkling of the wealthy hoiirgeoisie, who sought, 
by holding aloof, to curry favor with the throne. 
The rank and file of the army were in sympathy 
with it almost to a man. The Bund, in short, had, 
by a silent, bloodless revolution, become the master 
and dictator of public political feeling in Russia. 

Thus inevitably the three emperors found them- 
selves isolated upon their respective thrones, sur- 
rounded only by a meagre and weak-kneed follow- 
ing of impotent courtiers or paid officials, while 
their opponents were strong, united, and alert. In- 
evitably, I said, for it was impossible in an age 
where the printing-press and the telegraph were 
daily distributing knowledge and information broad- 
cast, that any such antiquated nonsense as the in- 
herent hereditary right of one man or one family to 



114 '^BIETIGHEIM." 

govern an entire nation should long be tolerated. 
None knew this better than the monarchs them- 
, selves. The time when the three emperors could 
hobnob at Gastein or Ischl and arrange the affairs 
of nearly two hundred millions of subjects over a 
dinner-table was past. They had now to look those 
bereaved and impoverished subjects in the face, 
and give an account of their stewardship ; and the 
first question that they had to answer was this : 
'' What guarantees can you give us against another 
Bietigheim ^" 

Then European republicanism took concerted 
action. The social revolution, which but for Bietig- 
heim would have been one of fire and blood, be- 
came a peaceful one, enacted with dignity and 
order, and under all due forms of law. It was not 
the work of a single day. It had been in prepara- 
tion for years, gaining strength with the election of 
each new Republican member from districts previ- 
ously represented by monarchists, and daily laying 
its foundations broader and deeper among the peo- 
ple, so that, when the change of government really 
came, it was only the cap-stone to a structure of 
which the corner-stone had long since been laid. 

I speak now more especially of the downfall of 
the three great empires, as that was the first phase 
of the world's political reformation — a downfall 
somewhat accelerated, it may be, by the fact that 
since the Treaty of Carlsruhe the three courts, while 
maintaining an outward semblance of their former 
friendship, were in reality full of bitterness against 
each other, as partners in defeat are generally apt 



*ITS CAUSES, COST, AISTI) CONSEQUEN-CES. 115 

to be. Deprived thus of each other's moral sym- 
pathy, support, and countenance, they resisted with 
so much the less confidence the inroads of those 
domestic foes who were rapidly undermining the 
foundations of their thrones. Germany, too, had 
lost her tower of strength, Bismarck, whose pride 
and iron will had not long survived the humiliation 
of defeat, and in whose death imperialism lost its 
Stan chest and most able defender. In short, Eu- 
ropean republicanism, wliich had barely escaped a 
throttling in its birth, now waxed strong and healthy 
in its youthful manhood, not only capable of de- 
fending itself, but of doing more, of taking the 
aggressive and lifting up its voice and right arm 
to demand free government. 

It is to the everlasting credit of the leaders of this 
movement in Germany and Austria that, seeing 
their strength and knowing the longed-for goal to 
be at hand, they went one step farther to listen to 
the voice of humanity, and to make the blow they 
were about to strike a bloodless one. It would have 
been a very easy matter for them to precipitate a 
conflict in which many lives would have been lost 
and much property destroyed without materially 
endangering the ultimate success of their plans ; 
but they preferred to do otherwise ; they won over 
the army, and so thoroughly matured their plans 
that when on a given day — the 12th of February, 
1893 — Herr Scholler, in the Berlin Reichstag, and 
Herr Endry, in the Yienna Parliament, ascended 
the Tribune and moved to proclaim the republic, 
the bubble of imperial power collapsed. The gov- 



116 '' BIETIGHEIM." *• 

ernments found tliemselves in a helpless and hope- 
less minority, utterly unable to stay the popular tide. 
Resistance, even had it been possible, would have 
been vain. From all quarters of Germany and 
Austria telegrams came pouring in from prominent 
leaders, giving in their adhesion to the new regime. 
The moody King of Bavaria shut himself in one of 
his mountain castles and awaited events ; his royal 
neighbor of Wiirtemberg passively submitted to the 
situation, and simply offered a protest ; the King 
of Saxony endeavored to secure the removal and 
concealment of the valuable crown-jewels at Dres- 
den, but the attempt was discovered and His Majesty 
placed under guard in his own palace ; the Grand 
Duke of Baden, related by ties of blood to the im- 
perial family, first entered a solemn and vigorous 
protest against the change, and then withdrew with 
his family and suite to one of his hunting castles at 
Salem, near the Lake of Constance ; the large com- 
mercial cities, Bremen, Hamburg, and Frankfort, 
always more or less republican in sentiment, wel- 
comed the news joyfully, and promised the new 
Government active support. In Austria some dis- 
orders, resulting in bloodshed, ensued, but they 
were of short duration. Hungary rejoiced through- 
out the length and breadth of her borders at the 
change which freed her from Austrian subjugation, 
and Budapest was brilliantly illuminated in honor 
of the new republic. 

I outline thus briefly these important events, leav- 
ing it to your intelligent imagination to fill in the 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 117 

innumerable details of the picture — tlie uprootings 
of old traditions, the conflicts of pride and patriot- 
ism, the sighs and tears over departed ranks and 
titles, the high hopes or gloom j forebodings for 
the future to which this new order of things gave 
birth in the hearts of the good j)eople of that day. 
I leave you, too, to imagine the effect which the 
news produced upon the rest of the world — that is, 
the countries not immediately interested. Russia 
had scarcely time to realize what had happened ere 
her turn came too. The atmosphere of republican- 
ism and the light of a new political dawn permeated 
every chink and cranny of the mouldy structure of 
Russian autocracy. The pressure of public opinion, 
botli from within and without, became such that it 
could no longer be withstood, and on the 13th of 
March, 1893, the twelfth anniversary of his ascent 
to the throne, Alexander III. publicly abdicated 
his sovereignty. The heir apparent, his son, 
I^icholas, a youth of twenty-five, reluctant to re- 
linquish his claims to the imperial succession, gath- 
ered together a small following of nobility and mili- 
tary officers, still faithful to ancient tradition, and 
offered a strenuous but brief and ineffectual resist- 
ance to the transfer of the government to the repre- 
sentatives of the people. The petty monarchs of 
Roumania and the Balkan provinces found their 
palaces besieged by eager throngs demanding their 
abdication. Ferdinand of Roumania refused, and 
was promptly deposed ; Alexander of Bulgaria 
submitted to the will of his peoj)le, and was subse- 
quently chosen their president. Milan of Servia 



118 '• BIETIGHEIM." 

fled his kingdom and took refuge in the south of 
France, where he died in 1899. King Konstan- 
tinos, who had only been one year upon the throne 
of Greece, sensibly recognized the turn which 
European pohtical affairs were taking, and issued a 
plebiscites under which his people were to decide 
what form of government they preferred. The re- 
sult was a foregone conclusion ; in July the king 
abdicated, and Greece was once more a republic. 

The one great and principal danger in this rapid 
transfer of all Eastern Euroj)e to Republicanism 
was evident at a glance : it was the danger of ex- 
treme measures, begotten of over-confidence and of 
utter inexperience in the art of self-government. 
Ardent and unselfish as were the Republican leaders 
of Europe, it must not be forgotten that they were 
but mortal, and that they found themselves not only 
carried along upon the very crest of a great wave 
of success and popularity — itself a dangerous test for 
any man or set of men — but that they had to deal 
with constituencies reared under despotism, accus- 
tomed to look upon their rulers as the school-boy 
looks upon the rod, bigoted in their hatred, bitter 
in their vindictiveness, and all ignorant of the in- 
ward significance of " a government of the people, 
by the people, and for the people." To most of 
these the Republic was a chimera. It was a fair 
angel for whose coming they had yearned and prayed 
and waited ; yet when it came and met them and 
stretched forth its hands to them, they did not 
recognize the object of their hopes and yearnings. 
It may, .1 think, truly be said — it has, in fact, been 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AN"D CONSEQUENCES. 119 

said by one historian of this twentieth century— 
that, at the close of 1893, there were not in all the 
newly declared republics of Europe over a score of 
recognized 23olitical leaders who could have sat in 
the Senate of the United States and been regarded 
as capable men, imbued with sound, practical, and 
reasonable republican plans and opinions. 

This was not surprising ; on the contrary, it would 
have been surprising had it been otherwise. The 
enemies of free thought and free government saw 
all this with a furtive smile of delight, and watched 
and waited for their turn to come again. But it 
never came, and, as we may now, after the lapse of 
nearly half a century, reasonably suppose, it never 
will come. Had the dawn of European republican- 
ism been a synonym for bloodshed and rapine ; had 
dynamite taken the place of logic, and had legisla- 
tion been replaced by the sword and torch, it is safe 
to suppose that, at no distant day, possibly even ere 
this, people would have gone willingly back to the 
old regime of throne and crown, exclaiming, " Of 
two great evils, give us the lesser. " But, fortunate- 
ly, it was otherwise. Moderation prevailed ; that is 
to say, comparative moderation, in that no guillo- 
tines were set up, no cities burned, no mobs set in 
motion, and republicanism grew and took new root 
daily. The considerate personal treatment extended 
to the dispossessed monarchs and their families fur- 
nishes, perhaps, the best indication of the moderate 
and liberal spirit of the time. In Germany and 
Austria the deposed emperors were offered the 
alternative of taking the oath of allegiance to the 



120 '^BIETIGHEIM.'* 

republic and becoming plain citizens like the rest, 
or of leaving tlie country. Both preferred the lat- 
ter. The German emperor and his family removed 
to London, where ties of kindred assured them a 
welcome. Francis Joseph of Austria passed his few 
remaining years at Paris or in the South of France. 
Strange to say, the Czar gave in his allegiance to 
the new regime, professing a love for his country 
which was superior to all ambition or self-interest. 
But he retired to a small property which he owned 
in the Crimea, and, though discharging faithfully 
thereafter all his duties as a citizen, never set foot 
in St. Petersburo; or Moscow aojain. The minor 
princes, whose name, especially in Germany, was 
legion, refused, almost without exception, to recog- 
nize the new order of things, and went into volun- 
tary exile, some to Paris, some to Great Britain, 
and a few to this country, where they or their de- 
scendants have in most cases become useful and re- 
spected citizens. When I remind you that an 
Oldenburg is now Lieutenant-Governor of Minne- 
sota ; that a Weimar represents a Wisconsin dis- 
trict in Congress ; that a Schaumburg-Lippe is Col- 
lector of Customs at Louisville, and that a Haps- 
burg lately declined the nomination for Governor 
of California, you will realize how these offshoots 
of European royalty have, within half a century, 
been absorbed into our population and become part 
and parcel of ourselves. 

1 need not weary you with reciting in detail the 
measures taken for the establishment of the new 



/ 



ITS CAUSKS, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 121 

republics ; suffice it to say that peace and order pre- 
vailed, that Constitutional conventions assembled, 
that general elections were held, and that, early 
in 189J:, only three years after the echo of Bietig- 
heim^s cannon had died away, the provisional Ger- 
man, E-ussian, and Austrian republics had all been 
recognized by the Washington Government and 
by the other great powers, some of whom, how- 
ever, England and Italy more especially, looked 
askance upon the new state of affairs. But of this 
I shall speak later. In the United States, notwith- 
standino; the universal satisfaction felt with the 
changed political complexion of the Old World, a 
diversity of opinion existed as to the outlook. Many 
contended that republics, constructed upon the ruins 
of ancient monarchies, were built upon an insecure 
foundation and could not prove permanent ; others 
refuted this theory by pointing to the French re- 
public, which, for a quarter of a century, had weath- 
ered all sorts of political hurricanes. Many and 
sincere were the appeals put forth by the press, by 
organized societies, and by individuals to the Kepub- 
licans of Europe, entreating them to move slowly 
and to legislate with prudence and moderation. 
These had their effect, too, for the land of W ash- 
in o-t on and Franklin and Adams and Jefferson, from 
being an object of dread and mistrust to European 
tyrants, had now come to be looked upon as the 
model after which all republics should be patterned. 
All things considered, it is surprising how quietly 
and quickly the transition was effected, and how, as 
a matter of fact, the people settled down into the 



122 "bietighbim." 

new order of affairs. Business continued in its ac- 
customed channels, agriculture and industrial pur- 
suits thrived or lagged as usual, people were born, 
and married, and died just the same as ever — in 
short, when the republican spectre had once become 
a tangible creature, people quickly accepted the 
fact, and the world wagged on as before. 

About this time there appeared on the political 
and social horizon a man destined to exert a power- 
ful influence upon the age in which he lived, and to 
take rank as one of the most singular characters in 
the world's history. I refer to Emanuel Winter- 
hoff. 

Born of peasant parents near Cassel, Germany, 
in 1850, receiving only such education as was ob- 
tainable at a public school or by studying in bor- 
rowed books at such odd moments as he could spare 
from his trade as a saddler's apprentice, he first 
emerged from obscurity in 1887 by the publication 
at Leipzig of a pamphlet entitled '' Der Arheiter, 
und Sein Lohn''^ (''The Workingman and His 
Pay "), attacking Bismarck's law for the insurance 
of workingmen, for which he suifered six months' 
imprisonment. We next find him defeated twice 
in succession (1888 and 1889) as Socialist candidate 
for the Reichstag, and in 1891, upon the re-entry 
of the defeated troops at Berlin, loudly denouncing 
the imperial Government in the streets of Frank- 
fort, for which he was again imprisoned, only ob- 
taining his release two years later, when the republic 
was declared. 




EMANUEL WIXIEWIIOEF. 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 123 

Up to this time Winterlioff liad been regarded as 
merely an agitator. But with the dawn of the new 
era he appeared in the Heichstag, and soon won 
recognition by the depth and broadness of his views 
and his wonderful force and eloquence in their ad- 
vocacy. Unpretentious and nnselfish in all that 
pertained to his personal interests, imbued with a 
sincere spirit of philanthropy, a deep sense of con- 
viction which showed itself in every word and act, 
and a rare toleration for the opinions of his oppo- 
nents, this remarkable man speedily won the enthu- 
siastic regard and confidence of all lovers of liberty, 
and the silent respect of its foes. Earlier in life 
he had ardently devoted himself to the study of 
Free Masonry, and throughout his entire career 
he maintained the practice of its principles to be 
the truest and best religion for mankind. Nay, he 
even went further, and advocated the application 
of its system of organization and government to the 
State. ''A Universal Rej)ubhc," he declared, 
'' organized and administered upon the basis of a 
Masonic Lodge, will realize the highest measure of 
prosperity for the human race, and prove as endur- 
ing as mankind itself." 

Among the innumerable theories of government, 
some few of them practicable, but most of them 
quite the reverse, which were put forward during 
the transition period intervening between the formal 
declaration of the republics and the time when they 
finally achieved stability, none took a wider and 
deeper hold upon the masses than this one of Win- 
terhoif's. Briefly stated, his plan was that of a 



124 '^BIETIGHEIM. " 

political structure based upon trade guilds, mem- 
bership in one or another of which was to be bind- 
ing upon every male citizen. These guilds were 
composed of three grades of mem-bers, the highest 
of which elected from among its own members a 
Master to serve for one year. Masters of Guilds 
in turn were organized into Grand Guilds of two 
hundred each, and elected their Grand Masters to 
ser^e for two years. The Grand Masters in turn 
met in Councils of one hundred each, and elected 
their Chief Councillors to serve for three years. 
These Chief Councillors in turn met in Conclaves 
of twenty-five each and chose their electors to serve 
for four years, forming an Electoral College, which 
chose, from its own members, a President and Yice- 
President to serve for five years, both being eligible 
to re-election. 

I make no comments upon this proposed system ; 
I simply recount its leading features. Its govern- 
ment was to be absolutely paternal in its nature. 
The State was to operate the railroads, steamships, 
telegraphs, telephones, ferries, factories — every- 
thing. Barter and commerce were to disappear as 
private sources of emolument, and labor was to be 
the sole standard of value. All the produce of the 
land, all the wares produced by the guilds, were to 
be turned in to the Government warehouses and 
credited to the guilds producing them, which, in 
turn, were authorized to draw out their equivalent 
in other produce and other wares to balance their 
account, the standard of value being the product of 
an average workman in one day of eight hours' labor. 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 125 

There were to be no rich, no poor. Each guild 
was to provide for its helpless, sick, or infirm mem- 
bers, and also to furnish its^j>r6> rata share for the 
maintenance of the general Government, and of the 
employes engaged in the receipt, preservation, hand- 
ling, and distribution of the public property. For 
the punishment of all minor crimes and misde- 
meanors, Masters of Guilds were invested with the 
necessary authority over their own members, who 
had the right of appeal to the Grand Masters. 
Cases of murder, rape, arson, etc., were to be tried 
by the Grand Masters in Council, with the right of 
appeal to the Chief Councillors. There was no re- 
striction placed upon religious faith or worship, but 
pastors were to be supported by the contributions 
of those to whom they ministered. The guilds were 
to provide medical attendance and legal counsel to 
their members when necessary. All houses, land 
and real estate of every kind were to belong to the 
State, which was to collect the rents and credit them 
to the public treasury. 

These are the main outhnes of Winterhoffs plan, 
and he advocated it with all the earnestness of con- 
viction and all the fervor of his eloquence, not only 
in the German Congress, but throughout all Eastern 
Europe, journeying from place to place, through 
Germany, Austria, Hungar}^, Poland, and Kussia, 
and preaching the doctrine of his Universal Brother- 
hood to immense and enthusiastic assemblages. 

In January, 1898, he was at Pesth and Press- 
burg ; in March, at Yienna ; later in the same year 
he addressed an audience of fifty thousand Poles 



126 "■ BIETIGHEIM." 

at "Warsaw, and in October lie was preaching his 
doctrines at St. Petersburg, everywhere attracting 
vast crowds. In the summer of 1899 he appeared 
once more at Berhn, gentle, modest, and unostenta- 
tious as was his wont, yet with, if possible, a deeper 
earnestness and determination than ever before. 
Meanwhile the seeds which he had sown broadcast 
had taken deep root, and the clamor for the Uni- 
versal Republic, or, as some termed it, the Brother- 
hood of Man, had become so widespread that many 
already looked npon its establishment as merely a 
question of time. 

Meanwhile the rest of Europe could not remain 
insensible, even if it would, to the presence of tliis 
glowing furnace of republicanism in its midst. 
France, as may be supposed, had suddenly become 
extremely conservative, and assuming the 7'6le of 
an older brother, solemnly warned tlie new begin- 
ners against the danger of going forward too rapid- 
ly. Belgium, always more, or less socialistic, had 
thrown off the royal yoke in 1895. The stern and 
iinimpressible Dutch did not take kindly to repub- 
licanism, neither did the Scandinavian peoples ; 
they preferred, all of them, to maintain tlieir 
monarchical governments, and, with the exception 
of some slight outbreaks, managed to do so in 
peace. In Spain sad disorders prevailed. The 
Biscay provinces declared their independence in 
1893, and had ever since been maintaining their 
own Government, entirely independent of Madrid. 
Barcelona had also declared itself a free city, and 
the Spanish Government was powerless to do more 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUEXCES. 127 

tlian protest. The movement had spread until 
province became at war with province, and city 
with citj, and by the opening of the present century 
all Spain was in ebullition and disorder, with no 
immediate prospect of a restoration of tranquillity. 
Glancing at Italy, we find her political condition at 
that period anomalous. The northern provinces 
were in a state of revolt against Xing Humbert's 
rule, and Milan, Florence, Venice, and other of the 
larger cities were heavily garrisoned by royal troops, 
the people passively submitting to the occupation 
rather than resort to uprising and bloodshed. In 
the central and southern provinces republicanism 
had made, as yet, so little headway among the masses 
that the king easily maintained his sway. But the 
situation was critical, only existing by sufferance, 
and none knew at what moment some chance pop- 
ular tumult might not apply the spark to the powder 
and inaugurate a new political era in the land of the 
Caesars. In the Vatican, if the popular opinion of 
that day may be credited, there was a disposition to 
move with, or at least not to stem, the political ten- 
dencies of the time. To recognize and to accord a 
moral support to the existing authority appears to 
have been then, as always, the secular policy of the 
Roman Church. What though Atheism and In- 
fidelity stalked abroad throughout all lands, fondly 
deluding; themselves with the belief that this new 
era of emancipation from political fetters would also 
absolve mankind from a sense of its bounden duty 
to its Creator, and usher in what one of their great 
writers has termed the '' Age of Eeason " ? What 



128 " BIETIGHBIM." 

thougli fanatics were indeed found to preach against 
the family tie, against the worship of the Deity, 
against all that we are taught from childhood to re- 
gard with veneration and respect ? What though 
propositions were made in all the republican coun- 
tries of Europe to demolish the cathedrals and 
churches, sell their treasures at public auction, and 
devote the proceeds to the general fund ? l^otwith- 
standing all this, the Church of Eome maintained 
its influence over the masses, aided, whenever occa- 
sion offered, in the administration of pubhc char- 
ities, showed its consistency with the prevailing 
spirit of the time by greatly simplifying the interior 
ornamentation of its churches and its forms of pub- 
lic worship, and, in many instances, through the 
personal interposition of its priests, prevented or 
suppressed local excesses and disturbances. Through 
all this period its voice, never faltering, rang out 
clear and loud like a beacon-bell over the troubled 
political sea, ever exhorting to law and order, ever 
denouncing the infidel, ever pointing to the Cross 
on Calvary. Even those of us, my hearers, who 
are of another creed and communion, must unite 
in acknowledging the debt which civihzation and 
progress and humanity owe to the Church of Eome 
for her wise and fearless course during that perilous 
period. 

Let us now briefly consider the part which Great 
Britain was called upon to enact in this great poht- 
ical drama. You have no doubt already remarked 
that in the struggle of 1890-91, terminating at 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AKD CONSEQUEN-CES. 129 

Bietiglieim, slie bore, wlietlier on land or sea, a 
part which seems insignificant when compared with 
her previous pretensions as a military and naval 
power. But it should be remembered that she was 
hampered by the Irish question, and by her wide- 
spread colonial possessions, and was tied hand and 
foot by the ever-present necessity of being prepared 
to suppress uprisings in some remote corner of the 
world. This had been the bane of England's states- 
manship. It had its full influence in diminishing 
her prestige among the nations of the world after 
Bietiglieim, and it has ultimately cost her most of 
those possessions to retain which she had placed all 
else upon the altar of sacrifice. Still, at the time 
of which 1 speak, although England was less popu- 
lar than ever in Europe, her internal condition gave 
much cause for satisfaction to her own rulers and 
people. Mr. Gladstone's solution of the trouble- 
some Irish question was the crowning triumph of a 
brilliant career, and when, in 1892, Albert Edward, 
in his fifty-second year, finally ascended the throne, 
he found himself the ruler of a united people who, 
though inevitably more or less affected by the domi- 
nant tendencies of the time, and zealously demand- 
ing political reforms, were yet in the main loyal to 
the reigning House of Hanover, and satisfied that a 
monareliy, hedged in by j^i'oper checks and limits, 
would afford all needed po^^ular freedom. Your 
true Briton, in order to respect himself, must in 
any emergency follow a course different from that 
of everybody else. In this instance it was, perhaps, 
just as well. John Bull never was and never can 



130 *'BIETIGHEIM." 

be an avowed Republican. He maj, under a nominal 
limited monarchy, Lave just as much popular liberty 
as we have, and just as free a government. Such 
was, in fact, the case at that time. The existence, by 
sufferance, of royalty and nobility were but a sop to 
the Cerberus of every loyal Briton's vanity, a thin 
disguise covering wiiat was practically as good a re- 
public as any that could be desired. 

I ought to place one restriction upon the last as- 
sertion, and add that popular sentiment, while de- 
manding that Albert Edward should remain king, 
also demanded the disestablishment of the English 
Church and the substitution of an elective body 
similar to our Senate for the House of Lords. The 
latter measure was tantamount to a suppression of 
the nobility, so far as its political recognition v^as 
concerned, but it was unmistakablythe people's will, 
and it went into effect. A body known as the 
Royal Council, and composed of members chosen 
by the counties, cities, and boroughs, on a basis of 
their representation in the House of Commons, as- 
sembled at Westminster in 1896, and, as an evidence 
of the existing political harmony, it may be men- 
tioned that nearly one half of those elected had been 
members of the old House of Lords. The steadi- 
ness and solidity of English institutions were never 
better illustrated than in the system and ease with 
which this radical constitutional change was car- 
ried into effect. 

The Church question provoked deep feeling ; 
but the days of the supremacy of the English 
Church, morally as well as numerically, had long 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 131 

gone bj. Rome had already two cardinals in Eng- 
land, and her ^^conversions" were niinierons and 
constant ; on the other liand, the Dissenters had 
grown numerous and bold. The Church of Eng- 
land could, under these circumstances, no lonirer 
solemnly ajDpeal to the memory of Henry YIII., 
and demand recognition as the " Established " 
Church. The lapse of time and events had already 
practically disestablished it ; but the fact became 
a legal one in 1897. Thenceforth State and Church 
were forever divorced ; many a fat living vanished, 
and hundreds of sleek and well-fed gentlemen, good 
fellows, accustomed to idleness and ease under a 
curate's or vicar's robe, were confronted with the 
stern necessity of earning their daily bread. It 
was hard for them, it was hard for the good |)eo- 
ple whose love for their Church had been a part of 
their patriotism for Old England, to see the axe thus 
laid at the root of the tree which had been their 
shelter and their pride. But in the lexicon of the 
world's development there is no such word as pity. 
How many traditions, interwoven with the very 
heartstrings of mankind, in its various stages of 
existence, have been mercilessly crushed under the 
advancing car of progress ! And yet to-day the 
grand old Church of England, surviving disestab- 
lishment, still lives in vindication of its sacred mis- 
sion, and j)reaches the holy lesson of the Cross in 
all the four corners of the earth. 

I have thus endeavored to recall to your minds a 
general picture of the political situation in Europe 



132 ''BIETIGHEIM." 

thirty years ago — that is, at the close of the last cen- 
tury. Rememher that none of these facts which I 
have presented to you are other than mere historical 
ones. But I have sought to present them together, 
and in such relation to each other as to show that 
they were and could not have been other than direct 
consequences of the Titanic struggle which I de- 
scribed to you in my previous lecture. It was the era 
of the world's political reformation ; for statecraft it 
was an era of confusion, of chaos, if you will, but out 
of its doubts and uncertainties were to be crystallized 
an enduring peace and a strong and broad system 
of general po23ular government for mankind ; that 
political millennium prefigured by Tennyson : 

""When tlie Avar-drum throbs no longer, and the battle flags 
are furled 
In the parliament of man, the federation of the world, 

" There, the common sense of most shall hold a fitful realm 
in awe, 
And the kindly earth shall slumber, lapt in universal law." 

The theories of Winterhoff, to wdiich 1 have pre- 
viously alluded, though crude and conceived in the 
brain of a man but little versed in statecraft, took, 
nevertheless, such a hold upon the popular mind, 
and proved so fascinating to the spirit of the time, 
eager as it was to grasj? at anything as far the reverse 
as possible of the system of the past, that they soon 
took tangible shape and form. On the 1st of Jan- 
uary, 1900, a procession consisting of eighty organ- 
ized guilds, of a thousand men each, paraded the 
streets of Berlin, bearing banners inscribed '^ Es 
Lebe die Allgemeine BrildersGhaft^'' '' " Winterhoff, 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 133 

(lev Apostel der Freiheit,^^ ^' Eine Welt, EinYollc, 
Eine Regierung^'' and many otlier mottoes of simi- 
lar significance. Immense throngs witnessed the 
procession, and by enthusiastic cheering and ap- 
plause testified to the popular sympathy. In the 
Schloss-Platz the procession organized into a vast 
meeting, over which Ilerr Mollendorph, at that 
time a prominent member of the provisional Gov- 
ernment, presided. The speeches were not by any 
means fiery or fanatical. They were calm and argu- 
mentative in tone, breathing in every word a con- 
sciousness that might was on the side of the meet- 
ing, and that there was no minority with courage to 
lift up its voice. Telegrams from numerous guilds 
in Yienna, Prague, Petersburg, and Moscow were 
read, all glorifying Winterhoff, all urging their as- 
sembled German brethren to take the lead in in- 
augurating a Pepublic of the guilds, and all promis- 
ing to follow if the movement were once begun. 
In the midst of the excitement following the read- 
ing of these dispatches, Winterhoff suddenly ap- 
peared at the famous Kaiser window of the palace, 
and stood calmly regarding the sea of upturned 
faces below. The populace had caaght sight of 
him, his name was passed from lip to lip, and for 
full liaK an hour a tumult of unceasing cheers en- 
sued, during which Winterhoff stood, with folded 
arms and motionless, looking calmly down upon his 
followers. There was a smile of sadness upon his 
face. Perhaps he saw farther into the future than 
did the eager thousands around him ; perhaps some- 
thing whispered in his ear that popular homage is 



134 << BIETIGHEIM." 

fickle, that earthly triumphs are fleeting, and that 
at best " the path of glory leads but to the grave." 
But whatever his musings, the sadness and the smile 
alike vanished wlien, lifting his right hand as a 
signal for silence, he told the assembled guilds in a 
few terse and forcible sentences that the time for 
planning had gone by and that the moment of action 
had arrived. Then the curtain rose and the world 
saw enacted a spectacle such as it never witnessed 
before or since. Not only throughout Germany, 
but through Austria, Hungary, and Russia as well, 
wherever Imperialism had been laid low, wherever 
"Winterhoff in his wanderings had travelled, Guilds, 
Grand Guilds, Councils, Conclaves, and Electoral 
Colleges suddenly disclosed their existence as regu- 
larly organized and officered bodies, comprising 
among their leading members nearly all of those 
prominently identified with the provisional govern- 
ments. All had been arranged with wondrous pre- 
cision, forethought, and secrecy, even to the smallest 
details. The procession, the telegrams, the sudden 
appearance of Winterhoff at the palace window, 
were all parts of a carefullj^ and ingeniously con- 
cocted play, having for its denouement the solemn 
lifting of the leader's right hand for the proclama- 
tion of the political Brotherhood of nearly two hun- 
dred millions of people. 

It may with truth be said that no coii'p d^etat 
ever took the world more completely by surprise. 
I can give you, perhaps, no better idea of the effect 
it produced than by reading a few extracts from 
various leading journals, both at home and abroad, 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 135 



in regard to it. They were collected together 
shortly after their publication and reproduced in a 
pamphlet, a copy of wliich is to be found in the 
Library of Congress, at Washington. 

From the Berlin TagUatt, January 2d, 1900. 



{Original.) 
,, Das politisclie Ereigniss, 
welches in das neue Jahrhun- 
dert einfiihrte, mag fiir die 
"Welt ini Allgenieinen eine 
Ueberraschung gewesensein ; 
aber fiir den Geschichtssclirei- 
ber fiinfzig Jabre spater wird 
es die Dammerung eines 
langst vorgesebenen Tages 
sein ; eine Dammerung folg- 
end einer Mitternacbt, deren 
scbwarze Scbatten zu ver- 
scbwinden begannen als der 
Kaucb von dem blutigen 
Schlachtfeld von Bietigheim 
aufstieg ; eine Dammerung 
der Gnade und Wiedergeburt 
fiir die Menschbeit ; eine 
Dammerung, deren Tag so ge- 
baltreicb an Hofiinungen und 
Erwartungen ist, wie sein 
Morgen wolkenlos und frob- 
licb sein "wird. Wir reicben 
in diesem Glauben die Hande 
unsern Briiiern der Ziinfte, 
wo dieselben aucb irgendwo 
auf der Erde zerstreut sind, 
und senden ibnen Griisse und 
Gliickwiinscbe. Es lebe die 
Allgemeine Kepublik ! Esio 
perpetua*' 



{Translation.) 
"To tbe world in general 
of tbe present day tbe great 
political event wbicb usbered 
in tbe new century may have 
been a surprise ; but to tbe 
bistorian of fifty years hence 
it will seem to have been tbe 
dawn of a day long foreseen ; 
a dawn following a midnight 
'whose dark shadows began to 
vanish as tbe smoke lifted 
from tbe bloody field of Bie- 
tigheim ; a dawn of grace and 
regeneration for humanity ; a 
dawn whose day is as preg- 
nant with hope and j^romise 
as its morrow shall be cloud- 
less and joyous. In this be- 
lief we stretch out our hands 
to our brethren of tbe guilds, 
wheresoever dispersed about 
the earth, and send them 
greetings and congratulations. 
Long live the Universal Ke 
public! Esto perpetual" 



I 



136 



BIETIGHEIM. 



From the Vienna Neue 

{Original.) 

, , Das Wort ist gesprochen. 
Die Allgemeine Eepublik ist 
proklamirt worden und Eman- 
uel WinterhofE nimmt seinen 
Platz in der G-eschichte nicht 
. neben einem Caesar oder ei- 
nem Napoleon, der durch das 
gemischte Blut von Feinden 
nnd Anhangern ziir Macht ge- 
wattet ist, sondern als das 
Ebenbild eines Washington, 
iineigenniitzig seinem Volk 
ewige Freiheit zusicbernd, 
und fiir das Menschenge- 
schlecbt das Muster einer 
volkstMmliclien Regierung 
herstellend. Wohin unsere 
deutschen Briider geben, da- 
hin werden die Ziinfte von 
Oesterreich und Ungarn im- 
mer bereit sein zu folgen. 
Die Proklamation von Berlin 
von gestern bat eine scbnelle 
und scbarfe Antwort bei alien 
Bewohnern der Donau gefun- 
den. Es lebe Winterhoff ! 
Es lebe die Briiderscbaft der 
Menscbbeit!" 



I^reie Presse (same date). 

{Translaiion.) 
' ' The order has gone forth. 
The Universal Eepublic has 
been proclaimed, and Emanu- 
el Winterhoff takes his place 
in history, not by the side of 
a Csesar or Napoleon, who 
waded to power through the 
mingled blood of foes and fol- 
lowers, but as the companion 
of a Washington, securing, 
regardless of himself, eternal 
freedom for his people, and 
establishing a permanent 
model of popular government 
for mankind. Wherever our 
brethren of Germany lead, 
there will the guilds of Aus- 
tria-Hungary ever be ready to 
follow. The Berlin proclama- 
tion of yesterday has found a 
prompt and eager reponse 
from all the dwellers along 
the Danube. Long live Win- 
terhoff ! Long live the Broth- 
erhood of Mankind l"^ 



From the St. Petersburg Novosti (same date, new 

style). 



{Original.) 

,, W tietschenii poslednich 

20*^' let, nam Eusskim na stol- 

ko tschasto prichodillos ispy- 

tat' tschewo mozno dostitsch 



{Translation.) 

*' We Russians have too of- 
ten had occasion within the 
last twenty years to know 
what organization can ac- 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 137 



drnznj'mi, tselesoobrazno or- 
ganizowannymi sillami, tschto 
wtscheraschnia burnyia proiz- 
schestwia, niskolko nas nie 
porazili. S tiech por kak my 
— 15 miesiatsew tomu nazad — 
sllj'scbali na Niewskom Win- 
terhoffa, w odnoi iz iewo 
znamienitycli rietschei, my 
liscliilis wsiakawo somnienia 
"w torn, tschto wwiedienie 
■wsieobschtschei respubbki, 
ransche ili pozze dollzno byllo 
posledowat' nieizbiezno. 

,, Tschto sobytie etc sowier- 
schillos imienno wtscherasch- 
niawo dnia, eto tolko odna iz 
mnogich sllutchainostiei, w 
niepreriwnom riadu wsiemir- 
no-istoritscheskich sobytii. 

,, Nasche diello tiepier' uso- 
wierschenstwowat' i sochra- 
nit' sieitschas priobretion- 
noie, 

,, Poka,myraduiemsiatschto 
nakoniets dlia wsiech prosii- 
alla zaria dostoinawo ludiei 
suschtschestwowania. S wos- 
torgom priwietstwuiem tschu- 
diesnoie soUntse •wsieobscht- 
schei swobody, zamieniw- 
scheie na wsiehda-slischkom 
dollgo tiagotiaschtschuiu nad 
nami notschi rabstwa i des- 
potizma ! 

, , Imia-ze Winterhoff a budiet 
zapisano miezdu samymi bles- 
tiaschtschimi wo weiemirnoi 
istoni, i pamiat' iewo-kak 
IDolititscheskawo spasitiela 



complish that wo should al- 
low ourselves to evince any 
surprise at the stirring events 
of yesterday. That the Uni- 
versal Keiiublic would come, 
sooner or later, we have never 
doubted since we heard Win- 
terhoff make one of his fa- 
mous harangues on the Nevsky 
fifteen months ago ; that it 
came yesterday is but an in- 
cident in the onward march of 
events. It remains now for 
us to join hands and go for- 
ward. The dawn for which 
all lovers of liberty have 
prayed and watched and 
waited has broken at last, 
and the emancipated world 
emerges at length from the 
dark shadows of oppression 
and tyranny into the glorious 
sunlight of Universal Liberty. 
The name of Winterhoff will 
go down to posterity as that 
of the political savior of man- 
kind." 



138 



"BIETIGHEIM. 



tschellowietschestwa - ostani- 
etsia bllagosllowlena wo wie- 
ki." 



From the Rome Eco 

(Original.) 

,,11 secolo XX. s'annunzia 
con avvenimenti politici che 
scuotono il mondo intero. Da 
un giorno all' altro, senz' alcun 
segno precursore, noivediamo 
passare il governo e con esso 
le sorti di mezza Europa nelle 
mani di un partito esaltato, 
che potra esser ben organizzato 
ma che in fatto di esperienza 
neir arte di regnare e ancora 
del tutto bambino. Se v'e al- 
cunche di buono negli straor- 
dinaii avvenimenti d'ieri, si e 
I'inconsistenza dei proclamati 
nnovi principi, i quali, tra- 
dotti in pratica, non manche- 
ranno di ricondurre in breve 
tempo al migliore fra tutti i 
sistemi di governo, cioe alia 
monarchia costitnzionale. Che 
questa ofiEre Tunica sicura ga- 
ranzia per il benessere dell' 
intera umanita, trovo da noi 
plena conferma, ad onta delle 
politiche vicende dell' ultimo 
decennio. 

i, Ma se dauna parte noi con- 
danniamo le teorie di Winter- 
hoff, dair altra dobbiamo pur 
riconoscere il modo nobile e 
pacifico con cui le medesime 
vennero applicate. Se tutte 



d' Italia (same date). 

{Translaiion.) 

* ' The twentieth century 
opens with a startling political 
earthquake. Without a word 
of warning the control of half 
of Europe passes into the 
hands of a society which, 
however well organized, is to- 
tally ignorant of the science 
of government. We can see but 
one good to result from the 
events of yesterday— namely, 
that the very absurdity of the 
theories upon which the new 
society is based will lead to a 
speedy demonstration of their 
fallacy and a quicker return 
to the principles of a limited 
monarchical government, our 
faith in which, as the strong. 
est and safest political bul- 
wark for mankind, has never 
wavered through all the 
changes and chances of the 
past ten years. But while 
condemning the Winterhoff 
theory in toto, we cannot but 
commend the public order 
and decorum with which it 
has been put into operation. 
Could all popular revolutions 
be as peacefully accomplished, 
the world at large would have 
less to dread at the hands of 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND C0N3KQUEXCES. 



139 



le rivolnzioni politiclie si ope- 
rassero in guisa cosi pacifica, 
il mondo uon avrebbe piu 
luogo di temere di dover ser- 
vir piu a lungo come campo 
di prova a quegli ambiziosi 
che a danno ed inganno de* 
concittadini che in loro confi- 
dano, tentano mandare ad ef- 
fetto teorie non ancora ma- 
ture, o confuse e spesso insen- 
sate." 



ambitious and unscrupulous 
political leaders, anxious to 
put on trial some favorite 
scheme or theory at the ex- 
pense of their confiding but 
deluded fellow-citizens." 



From tlie Madrid Impargial (same date). 



{Original.) 

,, A pesar de todo cuanto la 
prensa republicana escribio y 
pronostico en los ultimos 5 
alios respecto a la tendencia 
politica hacia la republica 
universal, todo lector del 
, Imparcial ' sera no menos 
sorprendido que nosotros a la 
vista de los telegramas de hoy, 
tanto de Berlin como de Viena 
y de Petersbnrgo. 

,, Despnes de todos esos su- 
cesos tan turbulentosen los ul- 
timos anos habiamos de estar 
ya predispuestos a todo, no 
obstante un alzar tan repen- 
tino del telon ante una Eu- 
ropa del Norte y del Este to- 
talmente trasf ormada no pudo 
menos de dejar estupefacto al 
espectador distante. — Parece 
casi increible que el facto sea 
el resultado de una agitacion 
asidua y prolunga,da, y la ex- 



{Ti^anslation.) 
"Notwithstanding all that 
has been said and written by 
the Eepublican press of Eu- 
rope during the last five years 
in regard to ' the tendencies 
of the times,' every reader of 
the Imparcial will be over- 
whelmed with surprise on 
reading the dispatches from 
Berlin, Yienna, and St. Peters- 
burg, to which we give so 
much space this morning. 
After the events of the last 
decade, it is true that the 
world has been prepared for 
almost anything that savors 
of the incredible in political 
affairs ; but the sudden lifting 
of the curtain to disclose the 
existence, throughout Eastern 
Europe, of such an organiza- 
tion as that described by the 
telegrams almost baffles be- 
lief, and resembles more the 



140 



BIETIGHEIM. 



presion de la voluntad de una 
poblacion de iinos 200 millo- 
nes agitadd y preparada para 
tal fin. desde hace mudiisiino 
tiempo. Pronto llegaremos a 
saber si ese tan admirado 
Winterhoff sea en realidad el 
,Moise' que llevara sus fie- 
les del desierto de f ormas gu- 
bernamentales contendientes 
y de-esterilesteorias al Canaan 
de la fraternidad universal, 6 
si acaso bajo el modesto habito 
del apostol se esconde la toga 
purpurea de un Cesar ! ' • 



creation of an enchanter's 
wand than the preconcerted 
uprising of a majority of 
nearly two hundred millions 
of people. We shall see 
whether this Winterhoff is the 
Moses who is to lead his 
people out of the wilderness 
of conflicting theories of gov- 
ernment into the Canaan of a 
universal Brotherhood of man, 
or whether, under the coarse 
robe of 'the apostle,' he con- 
ceals the purple toga of a 
Csesar." 



From the Paris Tem^ps (same date). 



(Original.) 

,, Les revanches du temps 
ne manquent jamais a ceux 
qui sont patients et qui sa- 
vent les attendre ; ainsi dans 



( Translation.) 

" Time inevitably brings its 
revenges to those who are pa- 
tient and can wait, and his- 
tory furnishes no more strik- 



toute I'histoire ne se trouve-t- ing rebuke to Imperial arro 



11 aucune reprimande plus 
forte a I'arrogance de I'lmpe- 
rialisme, comme on la voyait 
a Versailles le Dix-Huit Jan- 
vier 1871 que 1' image d'un 
Winterhoff, proclamant la Ee- 
publique Universelle de la 
meme fenetre du palais ou le 
monarch Prussien se posait 
autrefois selon son habitude 
pour repondre aux adulations 
serviles dela populace Berlin- 
oise. 

,, Mais la France republi- 
caine.dejalongtempssatisfaite 



gance, as exhibited on the 
eighteenth of January, 1871, 
at Versailles, than the j)icture 
of "Winterhoff proclaiming 
the Universal Bepublic from 
the same palace window at 
which the Prussian monarch 
was wont to stand and ac- 
knowledge the servile adula- 
tions of the Berlin populace. 
"But republicanFrance,long 
since satisfied by the restora- 
tion of Alsace-Lorraine, the 
repayment of the milliards, 
and the ignominious downfall 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AKD CONSEQUENCES. 141 



par la reprise do I'iVlsace-Lor- 
raine, par le remboursement 
de ses milliards et par la chute 
ignominieuse a Bietiglieim du 
despotisinemilitaireAllemand, 
n'a aucun besoin de consid- 
erer les evenements d'bier 
comme una nouvelle humilia- 
tion infligee par le cours du 
temps sur son enuemi ancien ; 
platot doit-elle los regarder 
avec cette \ive inquietude 
qu'eprouve chaque peuple de- 
voue a la cause de la liberie 
humaine, et du gouvernement 
populaire, en voyant cette 
cause mise en danger ailleurs 
par la precipitation et 1' im- 
prudence, poussees, soit par 
des theoristes fanatiques, soit 
par des demagogues ambi- 
tieux. A laquelle de ces deux 
classes "Winterhoff appartient, 
I'avenir seul saura nous dire. 
A I'heure qu'il est, 11 est i)ro- 
bablement trop tard pour es- 
perer que les peuples de I'Eu- 
rope de I'Est reviendront sur 
le chemin qu'ils ont pris. La 
B6publique des Corporations 
parait etre un fait accompli, 
et il n'y a maintenant qu'a la 
laisser comparaitre devant le 
tribunal du monde, pour re- 
vendiquer, si bien elle le peut, 
son droit a etre reconnue 
comme modele d'uu systeme 
de gouvernement pour 
rhomme. " 



of German military despotism 
at Bietigheim, need not regard 
the events of yesterdaj'^ in the 
light of a further humiliation 
inflicted b}' the lapse of time 
upon her ancient foe, but 
rather with that keen solici- 
tude which every people de- 
voted to the cause of human 
freedom and of poj^ular gov- 
ernment must feel in seeing 
that cause imperilled in other 
lands through hast)^ and mis- 
guided action, instigated by 
fanatical theorists or ambi- 
tious demagogues. To which 
of these classes Winterhoff 
belongs the future alone can 
say. It is now, perhaps, too 
late to hope that the peoj)le 
of Eastern Europe will recede 
from the step they have taken. 
The Kepublic of the Guilds 
ajDpears to be a fail accompli, 
and it now only remains for it 
to stand trial, and vindicate 
to the world at large, if it can, 
its claims to recognition as the 
model system of government 
for mankind." 



142 



BIETIGHEIM. 



From the London Times (same date). 



•'If the English reader 
needed any further proof of 
the imbecility of the Kepnbli- 
can leaders in Eastern Europe, 
it has been furnished by the 
monstrous blunder of yester- 
day. It is evident that the 
entire population has gone 
mad, that no minority exists 
which is worthy of the name, 
and that all the men who have 
been prominently identified 
with the provisional govern- 
ments since the downfall of 
the empires are now either 
actively participating, or at 
all events silently acquiescing 
in the inauguration of the 
new regime. That Winterhoff, 
a scheming fanatic, with 



enough of the strolling player 
about him to beguile the ear 
of the masses, should have 
succeeded in gaining such an 
ascendancy is all but incred- 
ible, and will always remain 
an unexplained page in his- 
tory. But that he should 
have beguiled the leaders as 
well can only be accounted 
for by the theory that a uni- 
versal madness has seized 
upon the populace, prompting 
them to betake themselves to 
that political path which leads 
by the surest and most direct 
route to the brink of the prec- 
ipice of destruction. Quem 
Beus vult perdere, prius demen- 
iatr 



From the Extra New York Herald (January 1st, 

1900). 



•' To-day' s events at Berlin, 
Vienna, and St. Petersburg, 
which we publish in full 
special dispatches herewith, 
are too momentous, too preg- 
nant with consequences, for 
judgment to be passed upon 
them in a cursory way. Suf- 
fice it for the present to say 
that this popular uprising is 
the most wonderful instance 
of a perfect political organi- 
zation ever recorded in his- 
tory, and stamps its projector, 



Emanuel Winterhoff, as a mas- 
ter mind. But to organize 
governments is one thing, to 
administer them quite an- 
other ; and while giving the 
new Eepublic of the Guilds a 
fervent • God-speed,' the Her- 
ald will await with curiosity 
and interest the outcome of 
the great popular demonstra- 
tion which the dawn of the 
twentieth century has ushered 
in upon Europe." 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 143 

1 have deemed it best to devote so mncli time to 
reading you these extracts for the reason that they 
afford a correct reflex of the varied opinion of that 
day on the subject of Winterhoff and liis Hepubhc 
of the Guilds. We find the people of the Republic 
itself jubilant and hopeful ; the French patronizing 
and mistrustful ; the Italians and Spanish skeptical, 
and John Bull loudly denouncing the new regime. 
In this country people viewed the matter much as 
the French did — that is, wished the new republic 
long life and success, but preferred to wait awhile 
before considering it even a probable permanency. 

That Winterhoff should be chosen President was 
a foregone conclusion ; that he promptly declined 
any office and remained a simple member of a shoe- 
makers' guild at Cassel, his birthplace, was a bitter 
disappointment to his followers and a scathing re- 
buke to his detractors. It has, however, since been 
shown incontestably that under the modest guise he 
had chosen he continued to be the chief adviser and 
counsellor of those to whom the rulership was in- 
trusted. Tlie second choice of Chief Magistrate 
fell upon Herr Endry, a Hungarian, who had dur- 
ing many years' service in the Diet advocated re- 
publican principles with dignity, firmness, and tact, 
and who now addressed himself with all the ardor 
and ability at his command to the enormous task 
before him — a task which, however, was greatly 
facilitated, in its earlier stages, by the unanimity 
and enthusiasm with which the people themselves 
assisted in its performance, not only by their active 
support, but by carefully abstaining from raising 



144 " BIETIGHEIM. " 

any entangling or embarrassing questions of per- 
sonal riglits or privileges to hamper the successful 
introduction of the new system. At that period 
the people appear to have been ready to bear un- 
complainingly great inconveniences, and to make 
unhesitatingly great sacrifices in their blind devotion 
to the success of the cause they had espoused^ 
Under the kindly warmth of such a sunlight, what 
plant would not blossom and bloom ? Where all 
consent to bear and forbear, where sacrifices are held 
to be privileges, and trials to be glories, the path of 
the ruler is simple and easy indeed. And so it proved 
in the early days of the Republic of the Guilds. 

The system went into operation with an ease and 
rapidity which astonished the world scarcely less 
than had its inauguration, and ere the year 1900 
reached its close the transfer of all property to the 
State had been substantially effected, the Govern- 
ment storehouses were generally established, people 
were finding a ready market for everything they 
could produce or manufacture, and in general, to 
all outward appearances at least, a more than aver- 
age degree of prosperity and contentment prevailed. 
Silver and gold had disappeared as a medium of 
exchange, barter and trade between individuals had 
ceased, all purchases, sales, leases, or loans were 
made from or to the State, and all values were 
measured in ^' labor tickets" issued by the State 
and representing one, two, three, five, ten, twenty, 
fifty, or one hundred days' labor of eight hours 
each. Let us suppose, for instance, that Tailors' 
Guild No. 10 of Berlin turned in at Government 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AXD CONSEQUENCES. 145 

Storehouse No. 3 one thousand coats the a2:2"i*eo:ate 
labor on wliich amounted to, say, twelve thousand 
hours, or fifteen hundred eight-hour days. They 
were therefore credited with the equivalent in 
^' labor tickets."" The materials — i. e.^ the cloth, 
lining, fittings, etc. — had been previously debited 
to the Guild from this same storehouse, with whicli 
all its transactions must be had, and the amount of 
these materials, when returned in the form of 
finished coats, was credited back to the Guild, which 
consequently, at the conclusion of the transaction, 
found itself in possession of fifteen hundred one- 
day '' labor tickets" as its net earnings on the thou- 
sand coats, l^ovv these labor tickets were exchano-e- 
able at the storehouse for flour, for salt, for shoes — • 
in short, for any sort of merchandise or provisions. 
Sometimes the tickets were simply credited to the 
Guild, and not issued at all, the account being 
balanced by provisions and merchandise. Let us 
now suppose further that Tailors' Guild No. 10 
was composed of five hundred members — namely, 
one hundred and fifty apprentices, the same num- 
ber of craftsmen, and two hundred master work- 
men, and that upon the labor of these five hundred 
two thousand others, young and old, were dependent 
for support, thus making the Guild iu question the 
representative of twenty-five hundred consumers in 
the community. Allowing now five hundred men 
to work twenty-six days in the month, at an aver- 
age of ten hours per day, we have a total of one 
hundred and thirty thousand hours' work, or sixteen 
thousand two hundred and fifty one-day (eight- 



146 " BIETIGHEIM.'' 

hour) labor tickets ; for it must be borne in mind 
tliat the adoption of eiglit hours as a legal measure 
for one day's work did not prevent men from work- 
ing twenty hours per day if they wished to and 
could stand it. At the end of a given month, then, 
the Guild had so many one-day tickets to its credit, 
representing the aggregate of the amount credited 
on its books to the individual workmen for what 
they had done during the month. Thus A, for in- 
stance, was credited with thirty-two days, B with 
twenty-nine days, C, an idle or inferior workman, 
with only twenty days, and so on. In this way the 
necessities of twenty-five hundred consumers were 
met for one month by sixteen thousand two hundred 
and fifty days' labor, or for a thirtieth of one month 
— i. e., for one day — by five hundred and forty-one 
(omitting the fraction) days' labor. In other words, 
it took 541x8=4328 hours' work per day to sup- 
port the twenty-five hundred persons for that day, 
or 1,^5 hours' work to the support of one person ; 
but the five hundred workers could easily put in an 
average ten hours per day each, or an aggregate of 
five thousand hours daily, and this excess would 
fairly represent the aggregate of gain acquired by 
various individual members of the Guild through 
their superior proficiency or industry. But this 
gain it was not permitted to such more proficient 
or industrious workman to retain. He was obliged 
beyond a certain point to merge his surplus of earn- 
ings into the common fund. Take, for instance, the 
previously mentioned workmen, A and B. The 
former has six persons in his family beside himself. 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUEN-CES. 147 

or seven in all ; the latter has three, including him- 
self. Now we have seen that it cost on the average 
1,,5 hours' work to support one person j^er day. A 
therefore would on general principles have to con- 
tribute 12,25 hours per day, or thirty times that — 
i.e., 367,5 hours per month to support his seven peo- 
ple, while B, with only three to support, would 
be ordinarily liable for only 5,25 hours per day, or 
157,5 hours in the month. Now A, though a skil- 
ful and industrious workman, only received, as we 
have seen, at the end of the month, even with his 
best endeavors, credit for thirty-two days of eight 
hours — i. d., two hundred and lifty-six hours, leav- 
ing him 111,5 hours short for the support of his 
seven people, while B received credit for twenty- 
nine days of eight hours — i. <s., two hundred and 
thirty-two hours, or a surplus of 74,5 hours over and 
above his and his family's actual needs. Hence an 
equalization was necessary, and here came in the 
province of the master of the Guild, who assigned so 
much monthly pro rata, per cajpita for the main- 
tenance of the twenty-five hundred j)eople dependent 
on the Guild for support, basing the rate upon the 
yield of the previous month, after making allow- 
ance for the support of non-producers, such as those 
employed in handling the property and keeping the 
accounts of the Guild, and of the sick and infirm 
members. 

Under these circumstances, like the early Chris- 
tians, they had cast in their lots together, ' ' and all 
had one purse." If there was no opportunity for 
the accumulation of wealth, there was, on the other 



148 ^^BIETIGHEIM. 



5? 



hand, none for mendicancy and poverty. It was 
tlie question of labor and daily bread reduced to its 
primitive conditions, and Winterhoff, to his credit 
be it said, is reported to have labored and taken his 
labor tickets with the rest of them. 

1 could devote hours, and even days, to recount- 
ing to you the innumerable and perplexing problems 
and curious dilemmas which were constantly pre- 
senting themselves for discussion and solution under 
the new order of things. Even those which had 
been theretofore considered the most trivial trans- 
actions of every-day life came to be invested with 
endless formalities. I recall one instance, men- 
tioned by Wilkinson in his able work entitled " Win- 
terhoif and His Kepublic," where a member of a 
carpenters' guild in Prague took to wife the daugh- 
ter of a farmer's guild in Silesia. The niarriage 
ceremony itself was performed by the Grand Master 
at Prague in five minutes, but the formalities attend- 
ing the transfer of responsibility for the bride's sup- 
port from the guild in Silesia to the guild in Prague 
ran on for two years or more, and by that time the 
bride had died. Let me refer you for much de- 
tailed information on this interesting subject not 
only to Mr. Wilkinson's work, but also to Lowe's 
^'Germany under the Guilds" and Hopkinton's 
'' Europe in the Year 1900." 

And yet, at the risk of tiring your patience, I must 
ask leave to quote a short passage from Mr. Lowe's 
book, as an instance showing the difficulty experi- 
enced in applying the system of universal equality 
and equal rights in a community. 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AN^D CONSEQUENCES. 149 

" In the month of October, 1901," he writes, " a trouble- 
some dispute arose in the little town of Tolz, in Southern 
Bavaria. One Haeferli, master of a guild of wood carvers, ap- 
peared at the Government storehouse on a certain day when a 
fat ox had been slaughtered, and called for the Jilet, or choicest 
part of the beef (Schlachibixiien). The master of the farmers' 
guild which had turned in the ox interposed, saj'ing that he 
had already bespoken the Jilet for himself. At the same time, 
a master workman of a millers' guild put in a third claim for 
the filet, saying that he had walked five miles that morning in 
order to be there in time and secure it for his convalescent 
wife, who needed strengthening food. As neither of the three 
claimants was disposed to yield in his pretensions, the agent 
offered to compromise by cutting the filet into three equal 
parts, and giving one to each, a proposition which each re- 
jected, alleging that the third part would not be sufficient. 
The agent then proposed to draw lots. To this the three 
vigorously objected, on the ground that it did not solve the 
intrinsic question of their respective equal rights to the filet. 
The agent, being in a quandary, called upon the keeper of the 
storehouse (FerioaZier) for a decision. The latter perceived at 
a glance that the question was a troublesome one, and vainly 
api^ealed to the claimants to compromise it in some way 
among themselves. The miller then offered to pay an extra 
price of a one-day labor- ticket per kilo for the filet. He was 
promptly accused of conduct subversive of the public order by 
the two masters, and directed to report under charges to the 
master of his own guild. He refused to obey the order. The 
Verioalier then endeavored to allay the disj)ute by arguing that 
the filet was no better than the rest of the beef, that it was only 
a question of taste, etc. ; but the three persisted in their de- 
mands, each claiming an equal right to the choice morsel. 
There was no recourse save to refer the matter to the Grand 
Master for that district, who hax)penecl to live in Tolz. He, 
too, saw that the question was a delicate one to handle, espe- 
cially as in the mean time a considerable throng of good rej^ub- 
licans had gathered around the storehouse, evincing a jealous 
interest in the decision of this question of equal rights. The 
Grand Master was by no means a Solomon, but he decided the 
question on the principle of ' first come, first served,' and the 



150 '^BIETIGHEIM." 

filet was accordingly awarded to the master of the farmers' 
guild, who had asked for it when he brought in the ox. To 
this the master of the wood-carvers took a demurrer on the 
ground that the other claimant's request had been put in pre- 
maturely. This demurrer was sustained by the Council when 
it convened in the following month at Munich, and the Tolz 
Grand Master's decision was set aside. He, in turn, then ap- 
pealed to the Conclave, v/hich reversed the Council's decision 
and sustained his. Thus the case was carried up till it finally 
came before President Endry, who decided that in a Eej)ublic, 
where all citizens were free and equal, only a spirit of mutual 
forbearance and concession could prevent the constant recur- 
rence of such perplexing questions as this. He directed that 
the two masters be publicly reprimanded, while the poor 
miller who had offered to pay more than the tariff price for 
the tender morsel was sentenced to bread and water for a 
month. As to who was adjudged to be entitled to thej^^e^, or 
who, in fact, actually got it, I have never been able to ascer- 
tain." 

The incident thus described occurred at a time 
when the Republic of tlie Guilds had been already 
nearly two years in operation. It proves that the 
path of the leaders was by no means plain or smooth, 
and induces the belief that it must have begun to be 
apparent to the thinking ones that so soon as the 
novelty had passed away, so soon as the universal 
spirit of good-will and mutual concession which had 
marked the inauguration of the new regime had 
worn off, so soon as the selfish rivalries of human 
nature had resumed their wonted sway, from that 
day would the danger of disintegration begin. And, 
as a matter of fact, the novelty had begun to wear 
off and people were beginning, not exactly to com- 
plain of the many minor inconveniences in daily 
life which the new Teginne involved, but to think 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 151 

very tenderly and longingly of tlie former days 
when guilds were private corporations, and when 
tlie surplus proceeds of an intelligent or skilful man's 
labor went to his own benefit, and not to make up 
for the dulness or ignorance of a fcllow-laljorer. 
Theory was one thing, practice was quite another. 
The murmurino's be<2:un to be audible, and the 
authorities became consequently more harsh, 
which, in turn, only gave added force to the mur- 
murings. In the spring of 1903 Winterhoff, sum- 
moned, as is now generally believed, by the appre- 
hensive leaders, suddenly emerged from his seclu- 
sion and reappeared at Berlin, where he addressed 
the populace with all his old-time fervor and elo- 
quence. He thence began a journey over the route 
which he had followed in 1899, and was everywhere 
received with enthusiastic professions of love and 
veneration. His progress from city to city might 
have been one continuous triumphal ovation had he 
not, by his dislike for display, silently discouraged 
all demonstrations of personal homage. It was evi- 
dent that liis popularity and influence were undimin- 
ished ; if the public had fault to find, it was with 
the system, not with its founder. The tenor of 
Winterhoff's preaching was plainly inspired by the 
suggestions of the anxious leaders. He urged con- 
ciliation, forbearance, good-will, a subordination of 
personal interest and comfort to the public good and 
the welfare of humanity. He preached a gospel of 
genuine fraternity. It was a doctrine good for the 
angels, but alas ! he was addressing audiences who 
were only mortal. Tliere is no question but that 



152 '^^BIETIGHEIM." 

this his second journey proved a wonderful revival 
movement, and dissipated many dark shadows which 
had begun to hover low over the devoted leaders' 
heads. Other things being equal, it is quite prob- 
able that so long as Winterhoff lived, he might have 
been able by these periodical circuits to put off the 
evil day of dissolution for his political foundliug. 
But meanwhile other and unforeseen events — it is 
always the unforeseen that accomplishes most in 
history — stepped in to demonstrate '' the Apostle's ' ' 
fallacies, and to precipitate a result which, sooner 
or later, would have been inevitable. 

" Man proposes, God disposes." How trite, yet 
nevertheless how true, the proverb ! It was not 
ordained in the providence of the great Kuler of 
mankind that this Kepublic of the Guilds, cradled 
though it was in the prayers and tears and sincere 
affections of so many millions of His creatures, 
should endure upon the face of the earth. And 
yet, in what a strange and unforeseen way was its 
downfall brought about ! Truly, 

" God moves in a mysterious way 
His wonders to perform." 

In the summer of the year 1903 there began to 
be rumors of a probable failure of the harvest 
throughout northern and central Europe. The 
rains in May and June had been incessant and, as 
results proved, fatal to the grain and hay crops, 
which turned out to be only about one third of an 
average annual yield. The widespread Hungarian 
wheat-fields along the lower Danube suffered with 
the rest, while in northern Germany the total crop 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCKS. 153 

was smaller tlian any that had been gathered in half 
a century. The distress which ensued, first among 
the agricultural guilds, then among all the others, 
was incalculable. The tailors continued to turn in 
coats ; the cobblers, shoes ; the joiners, furniture, 
etc. ; but the farmers brought in only small quanti- 
ties of grain, and it was discovered that they were 
secretly hoarding considerable stocks of it, as a pro- 
vision against future starvation. Under these cir- 
cumstances, what were the tailors, cobblers, and 
joiners to do ? The Conclaves convened in their 
respective sections, and seeing the danger, endeav- 
ored to take prompt action by borrowing large con- 
signments of flour and breadstuff s from guilds in the 
Crimea and other sections where the crops had been 
good and a surplus existed. In a spirit of true 
brotherhood these loans were made, the manner and 
time of compensation being left to future settle- 
ment. Enormous stocks of provisions were thus 
brought mto the starving districts, without drawing 
upon any region outside that of the Republic of the 
Guilds. These stocks were distributed and charged 
to the Grand Guilds, which in turn supervised their 
distribution to the Guilds under them, and so the 
gaunt spectre of famine was for a time averted. 
But the remedy was only a temporary one. It was 
estimated by a well-informed writer in the London 
Times (November Ittth, 1903) that the total amount 
of grain and breadstuffs within the territory covered 
by the Republic of the Guilds on the 1st day of No- 
vember in that year would not be sufficient, even 
with careful distribution and moderate use, to sup- 



154 *^BIETIGHEIM." 

port the population of the territory beyond the 1st 
of May in the following year, and even at that it 
would be necessary, argued the writer, to transport 
enormous stores for long distances from some dis- 
tricts where there was a surplus to others where 
there was a great deficiency. 

By strenuous and harmonious efforts this distribu- 
tion was effected, yet day by day the store was 
diminishing, and the- only barrier between the peo- 
ple and starvation was the immediate importation 
of provisions from foreign lands. Had the need 
been confined to one section or to a limited number 
of population, the hand of humanity, which knows 
no national boundary lines, would have been 
stretched out without hesitation to extend speedy 
succor. But where, as in this case, every section 
with a surplus had denuded itself to supply the 
general deficiency and had thus equalized the degree 
of need over a vast extent of territory, the work of 
relief was too great for human charity to undertake, 
no matter how boundless its benevolence. Many 
generous contributions were indeed sent in, espe- 
cially from England and America. A stone-masons' 
association in London collected funds sufficient to 
send a thousand barrels of flour to the stone-masons 
of Frankfort ; an ironworkers' association at ISIew 
York sent a similar shipment to its brethren of that 
craft at Berlin. But the provisions, on arrival, 
were taken possession of by the State, and turned 
into the public warehouses for general distribution 
with the rest. The stone-masons and ironworkers 
murmured, but they were not yet hungry enough 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 155 

to dispute tlie enforcement of what was recognized 
as their common hiw. The incident, however, put 
a damper on foreign philanthropy, and no more 
presents of a thousand barrels of flour were reported. 
Meanwhile, early in December matters had begun 
to grow serious. The Government storehouses 
everywhere were overstocked with wares and mer- 
chandise of all descriptions, requiring in the larger 
cities the use of largely increased facilities for their 
storage. There was an abundance of everything 
but the one thing most needful — bread — and the 
supply of that was daily diminishing. Idleness 
reigned in every branch of trade and industry ; men 
with nothing to do and little to cat grew to be mal- 
contents, and began to ask who w^as to blame ; 
mortality and crime, especially in the cities, in- 
creased alarmingly ; masters noticed that their 
workmen obeyed them with less alacrity than be- 
fore ; and in presence of all these signs, ^vhat were 
the leaders to do ? Their first wish was to keep 
the real state of affairs as far as possible from the 
knowledge of the pubhc ; their second, to form 
some i^lan whereby enough provisions could be 
bought, borrowed, or begged from abroad in season 
to raft them over the emergency, until the gather- 
ing of the new crop. It was a perilous and almost 
desperate situation at best. The President, Yice- 
President, and Electors held a secret meeting at 
Yienna to devise ways and means, and, by urgent 
invitation, Winterhoff was present. In this meet- 
ing, if rumor be true, the leaders, with one excep- 
tion, frankly confessed to each other their delusion, 



156 ''BIETIGHEIM." 

and acknowledged tlie ntter impotencj of their 
system of government to deal with the momentous 
question now presented to it. Yain overtures had 
been made to foreign capitalists and speculators for 
loans of funds or provisions to be secured bj triple 
their actual value in the innumerable kinds of mer- 
chandise lying stored and unproductive in the Guild 
warehouses. INobody would listen to the proposi- 
tion. Several wealthy Jewish bankers, whose opin- 
ions on political matters, as shown by their invest- 
ments, had invaribly proved correct, had not only 
declined to make loans on any terms, but had pre- 
dicted the speedy overthrow of the entire system. 
The situation, in short, was hopeless, and the leaders 
were obliged to confess it. 

But at this juncture Emanual Winterlioff, ever 
hopeful, ever fertile in resource, broke the silence 
of their despair. ' ' I will go in person to America," 
he said, ^' and appeal to our brethren there to save 
us. Such an appeal has never yet been made to 
them in vain." 

The leaders clutched at the straw, but there was 
no time to be lost. Without his departure having 
become generally knowu, Winterhoff landed in New 
York in the middle of January (1904), and at once 
presented his credentials to various prominent mem- 
bers of charitable organizations and of the Masonic 
order. Tie found public sympathy already ripe in 
behalf of his suffering. people, and he lost no time 
in letting it be understood that whatever was to be 
done in the way of their relief must be done quick- 
ly. ' ' Bis dat qui cito dat ' ' was the significant 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AKD CONSEQUENCES. 157 

device displayed at tlie Metropolitan Opera House 
abov^e tlie stage where Wiiiterlioft* addressed a 
crowded assemblage of the elite of the city, speak- 
ing in good English ; and as the result a round hun- 
dred thousand dollars was subscribed before the 
meeting adjourned. The details of this rapid mid- 
winter journey of Winterhoff through the States 
reads like a romance to one glaucing over the papers 
of that period. It was the grandest exhibition of 
human charity and open-handed generosity ever 
witnessed. In Chicago audiences, ladies took 
diamonds and pearls from their fingers and ears and 
threw them to Winterhoff with passionate exclama- 
tions of blessings on his cause. The man's energy 
was untiring. He seemed sustained and inspired 
by a strength more than human. Before he had 
been a month in America over a million dollars' 
worth of wheat, corn, and flour had been shipped to 
Bremen, Hamburg, and Stettin, and to Trieste and 
Odessa, and another million was guaranteed as forth- 
coming. Alas ! in the midst of the enthusiasm 
which this noble outpouring of generosity evoked 
all over the world, there came sad news to Winter- 
hoff. As he was nearing San Francisco a telegram 
was handed him conveying the alarming intelli- 
gence that the populace at Budapest had sacked the 
Government warehouses for bread. The cravings 
of hunger, the mute appeals of starving women and 
children, had proved more j^otent than any desire 
for law and order, and the movement begun at the 
Hungarian centre spread like wildfire to all the 
larger cities, and in time to the towns and villages. 



158 **BIETIGHEIM." 

It was tlie knell of the Republic of the Guilds. 
Winterhoff remained in San Francisco only long 
enough to address a promised assemblage, and started 
eastward again next day, intending to take the first 
steamer back to Em'ope. But his anxiety and dis- 
appointment at the almost certain overthrow of his 
cherished hopes, following so close upon such con- 
stant physical exposure and exertions, were too 
much for even his exceptional strength, and on the 
second day of his journey he was removed from the 
cars to a hotel at Ogden, where, three days later, 
and among strangers, he quietly breathed his last. 
A simple slab in the cemetery at that place, inscribed 
with a square and compass, his name and the dates 
of his birth and death, is all that remains to show 
the last resting-place of the remains of this truly re- 
markable man. 

The news of his death removed whatever linger- 
ing hope may have been entertained anywhere for 
the perpetuity of the Republic of the Guilds. The 
entire fabric vanished, faded out of existence as sud- 
denly as, four years before, it had been conjured up 
by Winterhoff's magic wand. Upon the period of 
anarchy and suffering that followed I am indeed re- 
luctant to dwell. What time had men to think of 
public order and a new Government when the wolf 
was at their doors ? What voice had a Master or a 
Grand Master beside a family of helpless ones cry- 
ing for bread ? Jtlad it not been for the relief so^ 
promptly sent from America, nothing short of the 
miraculous interposition of Providence could have 
saved hundreds of thousands from starvation. As 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 159 

it was, even with the most strenuous efforts and 
most liberal contributions, not only from the United 
States, but from South America and East India, the 
famine was not entirely averted. History repeated 
itself, and, as in the days of ancient Rome, immense 
numbers of people from the nortli of Europe became 
wanderers in search of sustenance. 

Organized protection to person and property came 
for a time to be a thing of the past. Every indi- 
vidual protected himself as well as he could against 
his neighbor ; each village organized as best it could 
for protection against the adjoining ones, the rural 
regions against depredations from the cities ; in 
short, chaos and destitution reigned supreme. Yet 
the criminal records of that period show, in the 
main, a praiseworthy absence of violence and blood- 
shed. The year 1904: brought a bountiful harvest, 
which, with the enormous quantity of provisions 
sent in from other lands, tended to restore the 
equilibrium, and relieve public anxiety on the all- 
important question of sustenance. But the other 
great question — namely, as to how and when and by 
whom any semblance of organized government was 
to be restored, seemed up to the end of 1901: no 
nearer than ever. Manv thoughtful minds Avere 
groping to find a way out of the political darkness 
of the period ; many ambitious men were pondering 
schemes which would bring them at this juncture 
to prominence and power. Finally, the scions of 
the imperial houses of Hohenzollern, Ilapsburg, and 
Romanoff, thinking that their time had come again, 
and that their people had seen the error of their ways, 



160 /'BIETIGHEIM." 

each issued manifestoes from tlie lands of tlieir exile 
assuring their subjects of their unswerving devotion 
to their interests, and avowing their belief in an 
early recall to thrones from which they had respec- 
tively been deposed. But these pretensions passed 
unheeded. However bitter their experiences, the 
people, once possessed of liberty, were not willing to 
bow tlieir necks once more to the iron yoke of im- 
perialism. The first tangible movement toward a 
reorganization of the body politic took place early 
in February, 1905, when a Convention, composed 
of two delegates from each of the Oberamts or 
counties which had formerly constituted the king- 
dom of Wiirtemberg, assembled at Stuttgart " to 
organize a provisional Government for the protec- 
tion of the public welfare." This was followed by 
similar movements throughout the entire territory 
of the German guilds. Republican ideas were still 
largely dominant, and the character of the new pro- 
visional governments, upon which were to be based 
the permanent ones to follow them, was from the 
outset understood as to be determined in accordance 
with the principles of free popular government. 
In most cases this movement involved simply a re- 
turn to the political status preceding Winterhoff's 
proclamation, but with this difference, that it was 
only considered as temporary, and that the people 
were now resolved to go farther, and establish a per- 
manent system of republican Government modelled 
after that of the United States of America. This 
Canaan of permanency Wiirtemberg, as she had 
taken the ijiitiative, was the first to reach. A Con- 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. IGi 

stitution based on that of the Commonwealth of 
Massachusetts, and ahnost similar to it throughout, 
was framed by the Convention referred to, and 
being submitted to the people, was adopted without 
any considerable opposition. Elections were held 
under it in November of the same year, and with 
the beginning of 1906 the new Government went 
into operation, with cordial expressions of confidence 
and good- will from most of the foreign powers, as 
well as its sister States of Germany. The latter 
sooner or later followed suit. In several instances 
smaller duchies and principalities blotted out their 
ancient feudal boundary lines and organized them- 
selves into a single State. This work of reorganiza- 
tion not only required time — it could never have 
been effected had not the people themselves been 
willing to sacrifice their cherished traditions in re- 
gard to local names and boundaries in order to bring 
it about. Even as it was, so slowly did it progress 
that it was not until the summer of 1909 that every 
foot of what had previously been the German Em- 
pire could be said to belong to one or another of the 
new Eepublican States. In August of that year 
the following was published as the proposed basis of 
representation at a convention to be held at Leipzig 
by the twenty- one States to discuss the project of a 
Confederacy similar to that of the United States 
of America. 



162 



^' BIETIGHEIM. 



STATE. 



Bavaria 

Ehineland 

Silesia 

Brandenburg. ...... 

ISaxony 

Hanover 

Westphalia 

Wiirtemberg 

East Prussia 

Posen 

Baden 

Pommerania 

Thuringia* , 

West Prussia 

Scbleswig-Holstein . 

Hessef 

Mecklenburg^ 

Brunswick§ 

Hamburg 

Oldenburg 

Bremen 



Totals 190,042 



Area 

reduced to 

English 

Squarb 

Miles. 



28,870 

10,289 

15,666 

15,505 

6,777 

14,846 

7,771 

7,675 

14,729 

11,330 

5,851 

12,130 

5,651 

10,151 

8,524 

3,332 

6,091 

2,183 

148 

2,417 

106 



POPULATION. 



Census of 
1880. 



5,271,516 

4,074,100 

4,007,925 

3,389,155 

,970,220 

,120,168 

,043,242 

,970,132 

,933,936 

1,703,397 

1,570,189 

1,540,034 

1,465,215 

1,405,898 

1,127,149 

1,007,447 

740,667 

504,977 

454,041 

337,454 

156.229 



39,793,091 44,175,894 



Censxts of 
1890. 



5,864,225 

4,328,119 

4,135.266 

3,767,774 

3,226,997 

2,481,386 

2,365,222 

2,116,448 

2,005,116 

1,954,777 

1,862,665 

1,599,778 

1,590,211 

1,501,809 

1,225,208 

1,260,844 

908,622 

691,437 

680,555 

401,296 

208.639 



<n !/j <0 



20 
15 
14 
13 
11 
9 



160 



The Leipzig Convention, wliicli assembled in 
January, 1910, was a memorable body, not only on 
account of the great ability and statesmanship of 
the delegates composing it, but still more on ac- 
count of the wise and moderate counsels which 
guided its deliberations throughout. The fever of 
political passions had now passed ; the people had 

* Including Weimar, Meiningen, Coburg-Gotha, both Reuss, the Schwarz- 
burgs, Allenburg, and Anhalr. 
t Including Darmstadt, Cassel, Nassau, and Waldeck. 
X With Lutieck. 
§ Inchiding Lippe and Schaumburg-Lippe. 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 163 

learned by bitter experience that experiments in 
government are costly, and they came now with 
once accord together, as oar forefathers did in tlie 
days of Washington, Adams, and Jefferson, to 
frame a constitution founded on justice and common 
sense, which should endure for all time.;^ Thus, on 
the 6th of March, 1910, was ushered into existence 
our sister Ilepubhc, the United States of Europe, 
with a constitution modelled after our own ; and 
the universal enthusiasm with which the day has 
ever since been annually celebrated throughout that 
Union, and especially by the people of its original 
twenty-one States, is the best evidence that its free 
institutions are ineradicably planted in the popular 
heart. The beneficent influences of those institu- 
tions have already shown themselves in a stoppage 
of German immigration, in a higher standard of 
intelligence and knowledge among their laboring 
and peasant classes, in an increased independence 
and self-respect among the middle classes, in a new 
and heightened sphere of usefulness for the press, 
in greater activity in scientific discoveries and in- 
dustrial pursuits, and in a widespread and well- 
grounded commercial prosperity. These are what 
a republican regime has brought to United Germany 
during the last quarter of a century. 

In Russia the Republicans appeared to lack 
organizing power ; they seem to have been unde- 
cided and vacillating, and to have hesitated to cast 
in their lot with the new confederacy, the majority 
favoring an exclusively Muscovite Republic, and 
urging the difference in language and religious 
creeds as their argument in its support. But mean- 



164 



BIETIGHEIM. 



while Poland, ever ardent for liberty, and wearied 
with long years of oppression, had organized into 
two States, which were admitted to the Union 
within two months after its formation. Hungary 
and Bohemia followed ; then the Austrian and 
Balkan provinces ; and within little over a year 
eighteen new States, with an aggregate of nearly 
sixty millions of people, had enrolled themselves on 
the list of the United States of Europe — viz. : 



STATE. 


Area in 

English 

Square 

Miles. 


Population 
IN 1890. 


Admitted to thk 
Union. 


Upper Poland, 

Lower Poland 

Bohemia 


25,454 
23,703 
20,060 
24,629 
22,335 
28,441 
28,411 
7,654 
7,398 
21,215 
10,570 
16,600 
30,307 
19,615 
48,307 
37,860 
29,187 
3,550 


3,425,889 
3,120,532 
5,860,819 
3,588,905 
4,166,885 
2,635,661 
3,995,281 
2,530,621 
1,023,190 
2,416,132 
2,918,881 
1,550,000 
6,458,907 
2,991,404 
5,690,625 
3,013,214 
1,888,273 
265,956 


June 19. 1910 

( 1 << <( 

August 30. 

September 28. " 
i( (< << 

(( ii (( 

<( << <( 

October 4. 

<< << (< 

" 18. 

January 9. 1911 

(< (( <( 


North Hungary 

South Hungary 

East Hungary 

West Hungary 

Lower Austria 

Upper Austria 

Transylvania 

Moravia* 

Servia 


Galicia 


' ' 24. ' ' 


lUyriaf 

Koumania 

Bulgaria;}: 


( ( it << 

March 8. 
" 12. 


BosniaS 


(< ii (( 


Montenegro 


(< <( << 


Totals 


405,296 


57,541,175 





* Including Austrian Silesia. 

t Composed of the former provinces of Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, and 
Kiistenland. 
X With Roumelia. 
§ Composed of Bosnia, Dalmatia, Herzegovina, and Novi-Bazar. 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 1G5 

What had been known as the Austria! Tyrol ap- 
plied in September, 1910, for admission to the 
Swiss Federal Union, and was in the following year 
po admitted, after having been organized into the 
four Cantons since known as Yorarlberg, Innsbruck, 
Tyrol, and Trent. 

Thus, in twenty years after the echoes of Bietig- 
heini's guns have died away, behold how all the 
scene has changed ! By the will of the people of 
Eastern Europe, expressed through their ballots, 
there has grown up, not as did the guild Republic, 
in a single day, but by the slow and gradual proc- 
esses of careful deliberation, a Union of thirty- 
nine sovereign States, each represented by two 
Senators and its proportional number of Deputies, 
in the Congress which annually assembles at the 
Capitol at Linz. When we reflect that the largest 
State in area — E-oumania — is about equal in territory 
and population to the State of I^ew York, and that 
the largest in population — Galicia — does not exceed 
in that regard the State of Illinois before it was 
divided into two States a few years ago ; when we 
recall the fact that most of the States of the new 
Union are governed by constitutions framed after 
those of different States of our own ; when I tell 
you that Bohemia's is modelled on that of Colorado 
{applause)^ both the Polands' on that of Yermont, 
and Thuringia's on that of Ohio, you will perceive 
how great a similarity exists in many respects 
between the Young Republic and the Old. I say 
''in many respects," because in some others they 
have improved upon us and taught us lessons which 



166 ''BIETIGHEIM." 

we in turn ha^e not been slow to learn. Had it not 
been for the practical example which thej set, we 
should probablj have been using the cumbrous old- 
time system of Presidential electors instead of a 
direct popular vote, and choosing our President for 
four instead of six-year terms to this day. 

With Eussia, as you are aware, it has been quite 
another story. The dream of a Muscovite Kepublic 
has been but a dream, and one which gives no prom- 
ise of realization. Even a casual glance at the 
geography and social statistics of the vast territory 
covered in Europe and Asia by the single name 
''Eussia" suffices to show that the existing con- 
ditions for the organization of a government of any 
kind are varied, pecuhar, and totally different from 
those which prevailed in Germany and Austria. 
For instance, Enssia in Europe alone is two thirds 
as large as all our States and Territories put 
together, while Eussia in Asia is nearly twice as 
large. The proportion of our total area to that of 
Eussia is about as 3„ to 8„ ; that of our popula- 
tion, 11 (according to our census of 1920) to 13. 
The distribution of their one hundred and thirty 
millions, however, is very unequal. In Siberia 
there is but one person and in Central Asia but 
four persons to every square mile, while European 
Eussia, which contains nearly ninety per cent of the 
total population, has an average of about thirty- five 
people to the square mile, or about the same as in 
the State of Michigan. Glance, moreover, at the 
varied character of the Eussian population. Over 
a million are roving Cossacks, with about as much 



ITS CAUSCS, COST, AND CONSKQUENCI-S. 1G7 

capacity for organizing or profiting by a stable Re- 
publican Government as has an Arrapalioe Indian. 
About fifty millions belong to the two races of 
emancipated crown peasants and serfs, who, in spite 
of their seventy years of freedom, have not percep- 
tibly advanced on the road to intelligence and a 
capacity for governing themselves. Some twenty- 
five millions more of the Russian population are 
peasants, somewhat better educated of late years 
than formerly, yet densely ignorant in comparison 
witli our average countrymen. lN"ow, taking these 
elements into consideration, and remembering how 
thinly the population is spread out in villages scat- 
tered over this vast expanse of territory, it is plainly 
to be seen that, the iron hand of an absolute hered- 
itary ruler having been once removed, the danger 
of a relapse into anarchy was undeniable. So long 
as the '' People's Union" held together, peace had 
prevailed ; but, its mission once accomplished, and 
the emperor dethroned, the Bund lost the vigor 
and harmony which its aim had thitherto imparted 
to its action, and drifted away into intrigues and 
disputes which continued up to the time of Winter- 
hoff's proclamation. The Guild movement found 
a hearty support in the Russian towns and cities ; 
but as there were at that time in all Russia only 
sixteen towns, with over fifty thousand inhabitants, 
and as the agricultural people, composing the great 
mass of the population, knew little and cared less 
about guilds so long as they were left to till their 
fields in peace, great discontent was caused when, 
in the famine year, their plethoric granaries had to 



168 ^^BIETIQHEIM." 

be emptied to feed ''brethren" elsewhere, whom 
they had never seen or heard of. This planted the 
seeds of mistrust and disaffection toward Republi- 
canism widespread among the Russian peasantry, 
and may be taken as the principal reason why the 
country has remained in a state of comparative 
political chaos to this day. And yet the national 
pride and power are still there. Can we doubt it 
when we recall how, in 1918, an advancing army 
of two hundred thousand hungry Chinese, which 
had penetrated the Russian territory as far as 
Tomsk, was put to rout and practically annihilated 
by a force of half the number of Cossacks and 
infantry hastily organized from various provinces 
to meet it ? And is it not fresh in the minds of all 
of us that when, only ten years ago, the United 
States of Europe and the United States of America 
joined in an appeal to the people of Russia, urging 
upon them unity as the only means of securing 
permanent prosperity, their sensitive national pride 
resented the appeal as an act of undue interference 
from outsiders, and an attempt to tamper with what 
they termed ''the Muscovite idea"? Truly the 
condition of Russia is to-day an anomaly. But 
let us hope that the time will yet come, and, 
indeed, that it may be not far distant, when the 
Russian people, emerging from the baneful shad- 
ows of ignorance, prejudice, and intrigue, will 
follow in the footsteps of their German and Aus- 
trian neighbors, and seize the golden political 
possibilities which Bietigheim placed within their 
grasp. 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AN^D CONSEQUENCES. 1G9 

At this point allow me to observe that since 1 
accepted your invitation to prepare these lectures, 
I have frequently regretted having undertaken to 
treat so comprehensive a subject as the conse- 
quences of Bietigheim within the limited space of a 
single discourse. For while a narration of the 
direct consequences of the struggle which resulted 
in the final overthrow of Imperialism might with 
propriety be confined to the subsequent course of 
events in the countries where Imperialism had held 
sway, I should wish, did time allow, to go further, 
and trace the indirect consequences in other lands 
as well. I should find pleasure in demonstrating to 
you that the early advent of an Italian Republic, as 
heralded by all the signs of the present time, the 
tranquillization of Spain, the wonderful industrial 
development and commercial and agricultural pros- 
perity of France, and the constant growth of liberal 
sentiment and consequent abolition of shams in 
England, are all of them results flowing from one 
and the same cause — namely, the suppression of 
the bayonet power in Central and Eastern Europe, 
and the substitution of a well-organized, vigorous 
Federal Union in its stead. I should show you the 
incalculable benefits resulting from the general dis- 
armament of Europe and the absorption of so many 
hundred thousands of soldiers, who were before 
consumers alone, into the ranks of the producers. 
I could point you to the moral influences which 
have been exerted upon the heathen peoples in the 
more remote corners of the world, not only by the 
continued peace in civilized Europe and America, 



170 *'BIETIGHEIM." 

but by tbeir own freedom from the incursions of 
European armies coming, in the pretended interests 
of civilization and commerce, to seize their territory 
as a colonial acquisition for the mother country. I 
could advert to the great strides made in science 
and the wider dissemination of general knowledge 
among the ELiropean masses through the agency of 
an unfettered press ; coming nearer home, I could 
proudly point you to our sister Republics, the 
United States of South America, of Central 
America, and of Mexico, all of them prosperous, 
well governed, and at peace with each other and 
the world at large, and all of them united with us 
in an American customs-union. I could point you, 
finally, to the great blessings which have been vouch- 
safed to our own beloved country since the present 
century began. If giant monopolies exist among 
us no longer, and if the Senate of the United States 
has long since been purged of the charge that it 
represented only such ; if our once too frequent 
Presidential campaigns now occur more seldom, 
and, instead of disgusting the world with foul at- 
tacks upon the personal characters of the respective 
candidates, are marked with the dignity and de- 
corum which such an event merits ; if the general 
bribery of public officials has come to be a thing of 
the past ; if everywhere within our borders humane 
treatment is accorded and equal justice assured to 
every class, whether Caucasian, !N"egro, Indian, or 
Mongol ; if the strife between labor and capital has 
been long since laid to rest by the suppression of 
tyrannical monopolies, and through a wise system 



ITS CAUSES, COST, AND CONSEQUENCES. 171 

of arbitration between employer and employed ; if 
greater attention is paid to providing comfortable 
homes for the working-classes, and to a more thor- 
ough system of sanitary inspection in our cities ; if 
now, regardless of his wealth or social standing, an 
honest man is respected as such, and a rogue is 
branded as a rogue ; if, finally, the tendency of 
wealth, so dangerously apparent in the last century, 
to concentrate itself in the hands of a few, has been 
succeeded by a more average distribution and a 
general tendency to equalization — is not all this, to 
a greater or less extent, ascribable to the retroactive 
influence of the New Eepublic in the Old World 
upon the Old Eepublic in the New ? I think you 
must agree with me that European republicanism, 
and, through it, the repubhcanism of the world, 
have lost nothing — nay, have gained much — by 
incorporating, here and there, into their modern 
structures, some of the sound materials saved from 
the ruins of Imperialism, such as a more wholesome 
regard for the law's authority, a better protection 
to the safety of person and property, more thorough 
regulations for internal government of cities, towns, 
and villages, a stricter accountabihty for officials, 
and many other features which I need not take time 
to enumerate, but all of which were bequeathed to 
us by defunct Imperialism through its direct heir 
and successor, the United States of Europe. Shall 
not we, too, then claim a rightful share in the 
glorious consequences of Bietigheim ? And, review- 
ing all this wondrous picture of a regenerated 
humanity, devoted to the arts of peace, daily ad- 



172 ^'BIETIGHEIM." 

vancing toward a higher standard of civilization, 
and fulfilling, in its general compliance with the 
Creator's laws, the manifest destiny of mankind, 
can we not recognize that the past, with all its wrong 
and tyranny and warfare, has been but the devious 
and thorny path by which an Almighty Providence 
has guided His creatures to the green pastures of a 
perfect and enduring peace ? 



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Nj RA^- 6 6. 



NEW NOVEL BY ROBERT IV. HUME. 

"THE HISTORY OF A RECLUSE." Price $1.00. In 

Press. 

Mr. Hume in this story treats of some of the practical diffi- 
culties in solving the labor and other social problems. It is 
an interesting and most suggestive story. 



TWO NEW NOVELS BY IVAN TUR- 
GENIEFF. 

'•AN UNFORTUNATE WOMAN" and "ASS'TA." Both 
bound in one volume. Translated direct from the Eussian 
for this publication by Henry Gersoni. Price 75 cts. In 
Press. 

WHAT THE CRITICS THINK OF TURGENIEFF, 

Renan says: " No man has been as much as he the incarna- 
tion of a whole race." 

The Literary World, London, says: "He is an artist of the 
first order. His style is bright, picturesque, intensely human, 
and irresistibly fascinating." 

The New York Tribune says: " Turgenieff's characters are 
vital; they suffer with a pathos that irresistibly touches the 
reader to sympathy. Those who would write in the same vein 
get merely his admirable manner, full of reserve, of self-re- 
straint, of joyless patience; but while under this surface with 
Turgenieff lie trobbing arteries and quivering flesh, his imi- 
tators offer nothing more than lay figures in whose fortunes 
it is impossible to take any lively interest." 



FUNK & WAGNALLS, Publishers, io& la Dey St., N. Y. 



A NEW NOVEL BY JOAQUIN MILLER. 

•' THE DESTRUCTIOX OF GOTHAM." Price $1.00. 

This is a m )st graphic story of the times, showing the con- ; 
flict between the upper and lower stratas of society in New- 
York, ending in a great disaster to the city itself. It is an in- { 
tensely interesting and powerful story. Joaquin Miller is a ' 
writer whose fame is world-wide. 

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY OP JOAQUIN MILLER. 

The London Times says: " His writings are charged with pas- 
sionate life, and display a fervor of poetic appreciation and 
sympathy, combined with startling beauty and power." 

The London Globe s&js: "To follow him is lilie following a 
keen, swift rider, who rides eagerly, it matters not whither, 
and who attracts us by a wild grace and a beautiful skill as he 
rushes through scenes of luxuriant loveliness that would cause 
a less impetuous horseman to pause P-nd linger." 

The London Bookseller says: "Mr. Miller is a man of sympa- 
thetic instincts and deep reverence for all that is high and 
noble in nature and humanity." 

The London Academy says: " Mr. Miller has the faculty of 
making himselt felt through what he writes." 



FUNK & W^AGNALLS, Publishers, xo & xa Dey St., N. Y. 



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